Whispered Screams
by Angry Angel
Summary: -SxS Yaoi-HighSchool AU- Some wounds run much deeper than others. Some can never be cured. And yet, there are people who will try to heal them all the same, no matter how hopeless the situation might seem. They try, because they care. Because they love.
1. The Road and the Damned

**-:::-  
.::- WHISPERED SCREAMS -::.  
-:::-**

**!Disclaimer!**

Final Fantasy VIII and all of its characters are property of Square Enix.

**!Author!**

Angry Angel

_Copy this story (or any parts of it) and have yourself a taste of my wrath if I ever find out about it. _

**!Warnings!**

Yaoi (_boy_ love with the pairing Seifer x Squall), language (I'm not kidding about this one), non-con/rape, self-abuse, angst, descriptive violence, fluff, AU (Alternate Universe).

**!Summary!**

Seifer Almasy is the beloved son of two successful doctors. He's clever, athletic and almost too handsome for his own good, yet his life cannot exactly be labeled a happy one. He struggles with his sexuality and his identity, and is ultimately forced to change schools during his senior year. Though he is ambitious and energetic, he has no greater goal in life. None at all - except to escape from the seemingly so rough life that he's leading.

Squall Leonhart is the oldest child of a deep-down broken family. He struggles to keep up a façade of contentment, paying a high price for a happiness that is nothing but an illusion. Though he is intelligent and kind, he's also a loner for reasons that few could ever fathom. His childhood has been ruined by the dark secret he has been keeping for years, and though he'd have all reason to break free from the pain that binds him, he has no intention of leaving his past behind.

Seifer and Squall are two teenagers that are bound to meet and clash eventually, ultimately entwining their lives for better... or for worse.

* * *

-:-**  
Chapter 1  
The Road and the Damned**

_"Whatever."_**  
**-:-

"Shit, I'm gonna be late... fuckin' figures! _Shit_."

Hurling his school bags onto the back of his red pickup truck, a tall blond teenager who heeded to the name of Seifer Almasy was cussing up a storm. The noisy male didn't care whether or not his temper would wake the folks in his nice suburban neighborhood at this ungodly hour on a Tuesday morning; honestly, he had far more pressing things on his teenage mind. This was the first day of school after summer break, more so, his _very_ first day as a student of Deling City High - and he was going to be late.

He had moved to this town mere weeks ago, and he had spent most of his vacation setting up his apartment and getting acquainted with his new "home", or whatever you wanted to call it. Technically, home was about a three hour drive away, in Balamb City, where his parents lived, but for reasons that he usually hated to elaborate on, Seifer was now stuck in _this_ place - a grand eighteen years old, and all by his sweet, hotheaded lonesome.

To make matters worse, he had been forced to change schools before the beginning of his senior year, which would most likely result in his grades dropping yet another notch. Not that they had actually needed a shove down the grade curve - they had been steadily descending towards rock bottom all on their own.

Well, in any case, he had little more than twenty minutes to get his ass in gear and somehow into his math class without the crucial knowledge of where said class was even held at.

Yep, things sure weren't looking good for the home team, thank you very much.

As Seifer leaped into the driver seat of his brand new truck and slammed the door shut behind himself, he could practically hear the voice of his mother in the back of his mind, nagging him with possibly well-meant and _definitely _annoying pieces of advice that he never actually bothered to follow, anyway.

_"Have you checked with your counselor yet? Have you figured out all the places you need to go? Which classes are you going to take? Have you talked to the football coach about your missed summer practise? Have you made any friends yet? Are you sure you don't need anything else? And please don't forget what Dad and I told you about... well, you know what."_

Mothers sure had an impeccable talent of being so very goddamn irritating and patronizing with their uncalled-for demonstrations of parental care and affection. Apparently, Seifer's mother thought that his bisexuality (she refused to voice the term, and usually referred to it as "you know what") caused permanent stupidity. In her little world, he was completely clueless about how to properly take care of himself. But hey, he was eighteen years old (nineteen in December, for that matter), and he believed that he could take care of himself just fine. He didn't have much of a choice in the first place, being stuck in Deling City on his own and what not. Whenever would she understand that?

Besides... her and her husband, Seifer's father, were the ones that had kicked the blond to the proverbial curb in the first place.

Sighing, Seifer flipped his car key in the lock and started the engine. He'd have to hurry and break some land speed records if he held any notion of making it to class in time - and he did, astounding as it was.

Dawn was already streaking the greyish skies with bright hues of pink and orange, but luckily traffic wasn't picking up just yet. Seifer was able to pull onto the road and head towards school, which was located at the other end of town, without passing much more than the occasional delivery truck and other, fellow early birds that were headed to work or wherever.

As he stretched his long, lean body and let out a yawn, Seifer cast a bored glance into his rear view mirror to check out his own reflection. Gazing back at him was the clean-cut, angular face of a very tanned high school senior, as well as a pair of strident jade green eyes that were sparking with a natural, boyish kind of charm. He was a handsome young man, as he was told often enough. In fact, Seifer Almasy could easily be taken for your stereotypical high school jock - he was tall, buff and extremely popular with the girls... and fully aware of it, too. He wasn't exactly an honor roll student, but it wasn't like he carried any aspirations for geniusdom or a career in medicine, as much as his parents would have rejoiced.

On the contrary, Seifer was a natural born athlete. He played football, baseball and basketball, and he was also an avid track runner. Seifer was a guy who knew well of his weaknesses and strengths, though he usually tended to underrate the first and overrate the latter. All in all, he looked like any handsome, talented kid that didn't have a single worry to his name.

Of course, things were never quite as perfect as they might have seemed at first sight.

Just as he was tapping the steering wheel in boredom and quietly hummed along a tune broadcasted by his favorite local rock station, a sudden flash of black in his rear view mirror caught Seifer's attention. Irritated, he glanced out of the side window and onto the street that was still slick with rain from the night. Then, Seifer suddenly reeled backwards with a sound of surprise, completely taken aback by a motorcyclist launching by his driver side at neck-breaking speed.

The blond arched an eyebrow.

"What the _hell_?"

As the biker cut into the lane in front of him, his brake lights hardly even flashing, Seifer scowled. He couldn't stand to be passed, particularly so if he was already going way faster than the speed limit dictated. What the fuck was that guy thinking?

"... Why, I think you just earned yourself a free lesson, lil' biker boy."

With a roguish grin, Seifer quickly changed gears and mashed his foot down upon the accelerator. He had always despised motorcyclists - their dipshit attitude didn't seem to mesh very well with his own. Usually they'd try to mess with him, and he'd happily mess right back.

By all means, today was no exception.

He was closing in on the biker fast, and he certainly didn't bother to set his turn signal as he swerved into the passing lane. Smirking, he whipped his head to his right as he was about leveled with the motorcycle. The guy on the bike was wearing faded blue jeans and heavy boots, a black leather jacket and an equally black helmet. They matched the color of his ride. The book bag he had strapped onto his back almost made Seifer pause for a moment; this was quite possibly a fellow student of Deling City High.

_'Well... all the more reason to leave a lasting impression.'_

Inevitably, the biker turned to face him, and Seifer thought that he could feel the guy's irritation simmering off of him even through his reflective visor.

_'Ah, bikers. Nothing but a mind-fuck waiting to happen.'_

Giving a smug wave and a thumbs-down, Seifer floored his gas pedal and took off. Glancing into his rear view mirror, he could see the biker following him with his eyes. Sneering and leaning back in his seat, the blond returned to the right lane, and he couldn't deny that he felt pretty damn good about himself.

That was until he heard a powerful exhaust howling to his left.

He turned in what looked like slow-motion, disbelief evident in his angular features. Though he was going fast enough to justify the loss of his license if a cop was just lucky enough to spot him, his eyes were set yet again upon the guy on his black crotch rocket.

Seifer gave a low grunt.

"Motherfucker..."

To make matters worse, the biker flicked up his gloved hand and flipped Seifer the bird. He continued to hold his middle finger up quite unambiguously, ensuring that the stunned blond had seen it up nice and close, before he curled his hand back around his handlebar and cut in front of Seifer's truck the very moment that their lanes merged.

A hissing sound escaped the blond's lips, and he was rendered speechless for the length of a moment.

"Little fuckin' _cunt_!"

He slammed his hands down upon the steering wheel in frustration, spitting a few more choice curse words. They were hitting the suburbs again, and just like the biker, Seifer inevitably had to adjust his speed, although he made sure to stick as close to the guy's tail as he possibly could. Honestly, he could have probably breathed down the biker's neck if he had only bothered to stick his head out the window. They had entered the school zone now, and much to Seifer's disappointment, it was obvious that there wouldn't be another chance to pass the asshole straddling the black Honda motorcycle and cut his ego back down to size.

He'd clearly lost their earlier competition of male pride, and one thing was for sure - Seifer Almasy was a sore loser.

Annoyed, Seifer followed the biker further down the road and to the massive complex of Deling City High School. They passed track and tennis courts, a football stadium and an outdoors pool, until the biker finally pulled into a parking lot that was already packed with cars and students. Seifer trailed after the guy closely, not letting him out of sight. As soon as the bike had come to a full stop in a vacant parking space, a little ways away from the main crowd, Seifer immediately slammed on his brakes and pulled into the very same spot, effectively blocking the biker in.

Impulse and a very short temper drove the blond to lunge out of his truck and throw his door shut with an earsplitting bang. Meanwhile, the Honda owner had dismounted his bike and stood with his back turned to Seifer. His motions were unhurried, and he didn't even acknowledge the blond's presence. The biker seemed to be a few inches shorter than the brawny eighteen year old, and quite a bit more delicate in his build, but his obvious physical disadvantage didn't even quench a hint of Seifer's anger. The blond had barely opened his mouth to give that cocky little wankjob a piece of his mind, when the biker slowly removed his helmet and turned around.

Straight, dark brown hair that was almost artfully tousled fell out of the helmet's strict confinement and into a pale skinned, exquisitely handsome face. Narrowed eyes that were shifting hues from blue to grey glared at Seifer from behind thick lashes, and thin, dark eyebrows were mashed together in the creation of one of the unfriendliest expressions that Seifer had ever come across. The blond had to blink once or twice, fighting the urge to drop both his jaw and his anger. He wasn't easily impressed by fine looks, but this guy was completely fucking _bangin'_.

_'Aw shit, are you serious? What the fuck, man. Did he **have** to be this hot?' _

Seifer swallowed dryly, desperately trying to grind up his aggression that seemed to have spontaneously evaporated. To his surprise, however, the delicious, dark haired little piece of mind-fuck eased Seifer's way back into furiosity as if the whole process came entirely natural to him.

"Are you too blind or just too fucking stupid to find your own parking spot?" the brunette biker hissed, his voice threatening, and yet almost bored at the same time.

Seifer's anger returned almost instantly.

"Neither. I figured I'd take your spot and beat your skinny little ass in one go, you know, to save some time," the blond snarled in response. "Stupid piece of biker shit."

"Right, thanks. God forbid, I wouldn't wanna miss _that _sight," the brunette retorted, pouring on the sarcasm.

In return, Seifer adopted his most irritating, teasing intonation and purred, "No problem, sweetheart, I'll be happy to deliver."

"Yeah? What are you gonna do?" the boy snorted arrogantly, eyes glaring unimpressed. "Beat me with your dumb, loud mouth full of hot air?"

"You little piece of-"

"Ah-_hem_."

Seifer swiveled around at the sound of someone clearing their throat behind him rather pointedly. There were few things he hated more than to be interrupted, and honestly, he'd been rather unaware of students stopping in flocks around them to watch his confrontation with the motorcyclist. One of those bystanders turned out to be the guy obviously trying to catch his attention, and he had strategically placed himself right behind the blond.

Annoyed, Seifer gave the youth a curt look-over. The guy was about his height, remarkably slender, with long, wavy auburn hair and stunning, amethyst colored eyes. He was good-looking enough for Seifer to notice, though not particularly the blond's type, considering the dude was wearing a _cowboy hat_ of all things unholy. It didn't even look too shabby in combination with his plain white t-shirt and snug fitting blue jeans, but Seifer had no nerve for such stupid quirks.

Crossing his arms before his broad chest, he slit his eyes at the cowboy with an expression that suggested danger.

"The fuck do_ you _want?" he snapped, his snide voice holding a note of impatience.

The cowboy grinned lopsidedly, and he tipped his head in greeting.

"Seifer Almasy," he said, mock drama evident in the way he pronounced the blond's name as he took a slight bow, "Meet Squall Leonhart."

He had gestured at someone behind Seifer, and as the blond threw a half-glance over his shoulder, he instantly came to understand who this 'Squall Leonhart' character was supposed to be.

"Whatever," the grumpy brunette biker growled in response to Irvine's introduction, and he visibly tightened his hold around his helmet as he cut his gaze to the side.

Before Seifer had a chance to say anything at all, the asshole named Squall had pivoted on the spot and stalked off in the direction of the school building, leaving his bike somewhere between the curb and Seifer's truck as if he really didn't give a royal lick of a shit.

"Who the fuck pissed in _his _little Cheerio bowl, anyway..." Seifer found himself mumbling under his breath, while glaring holes in Squall Leonhart's retreating backside.

"Ah, don't mind him, man," the cowboy next to him commented blithely, waving one hand at Seifer in a dismissive gesture. "He's a lil on the, uh, antisocial side, you know? Don't take it personal."

"You got a name, wisecrack?" the blond retorted, while studying the other boy with newly aroused interest.

"Oh. Irvine Kinneas. Pleased to meet ya, and all that jazz."

Seifer couldn't help but tilt his head in question.

"How did you know who I was?"

"Your Varsity jacket."

Indeed, the red and white football jacket from his old team that Seifer was currently wearing had been embroidered with his last name. Still, that didn't explain...

"Our track coach mentioned you last practice," Irvine continued, before Seifer had a chance to ask about the revelation of his first name. "Seifer Almasy, all-state football, all-state track and all that other fancy all-state hoopla I can't think of right now. So... when I spotted ya jacket, I thought I'd come over and say wassup."

"Well, wasn't that awfully kind of you."

"Yeah, well, I also figured I'd better keep ya from socking our resident ice princess," the cowboy added. "You looked like you were about to go brawl-happy on his unlucky ass."

"... Ice princess?"

"Squall."

"What ya call him ice princess for?" Seifer inquired curiously, not quite sure how to place that nickname.

Oddly enough, it sounded like something _he_ would make up.

"If you really haven't figured it out yet, by all means, don't let me spoil the fun," Irvine replied with a cryptic grin, before he took a quick glimpse at his wristwatch. "Ah, damn. Hey dude, we better get going, class is about to start."

"Oh, yeah. Sounds good. Let's do it."

Seifer fished for his bag, retrieving it from the back of his truck. Then, he paused to study his vehicle's position for a moment. The parking job was lousy, no doubt about it, but Seifer found that his give-a-shit was pretty much out of commission right now, so he simply turned away with a shrug.

"Hey," he said, throwing a questioning glance at Irvine, who stared back at him keenly. "You happen to know where Kramer's Math 4 is held at?"

"Edea Kramer?" the cowboy lilted, and his eyes lit up with a kind of teenage rapture that Seifer could have only described as concerning. "Oh, dude, she's like, such a fucking _babe_! Man! You don't even understand. 'Fine' doesn't even begin to describe it!"

Seifer snorted, following Irvine past crowds of other students and beautiful old oak trees towards the school building.

"That's nice and all, but that's not what I asked, Casanova," the blond corrected him.

"Oh... right," the other youth drawled, as if that thought had only just occurred to him. "Yeah, sure I know where it's at. If that's where you're headed right now, you're in my class."

"Right on."

"Yeah. Let's hurry. Math is one class I definitely _don't_ wanna miss."

And thus was Seifer Almasy's rough start into a school year that would be filled with soaring highs and abysmal lows, and that would - above all things - change his life forever.


	2. High Noon

-:-**  
Chapter 2  
High Noon**

_"Be that way then. See what I care."_  
-:-

Deling City High was nicer than his old school; much nicer, to be quite frank. Rich parents had donated outrageous amounts of money to turn their children's educational facility into something that almost resembled a temple in its beauty. All buildings were freshly painted, seamed with green yards and carefully trimmed shrubs. The air smelled of fall and fruits, and a surprisingly gentle bell announced the beginning of classes.

Of course, as it was with most places of its kind, Deling City High's splendor only went so deep. Beneath its sparkling surface, the students of D.C High were no different than the ones in Balamb. Kids who had never worked a day in their lives and whose parents were loaded - Seifer could have sung a goddamn song of it. Both of his parents were doctors; his mother was a cosmetic surgeon, his father a specialist in internal medicine. Needless to say, Seifer had never worked for his money's worth, either.

But that wasn't the point.

He remembered his fellow students' looks only too well. Their struck, disgusted faces when the rumors about his sexuality had hit even the most oblivious of them. Seifer Almasy, jock of all jocks, had slept with a guy?

_A guy?_

It had been a downright scandal.

Well, his parents had pulled the emergency brake on the whole disaster eventually and decided to have Seifer switch schools. Of course, their choice had been an equally snobbish environment, equally prestige - but at least it had been different.

Different...

His backpack threatened to slide off his brawny shoulder. He adjusted its position haphazardly, semi-consciously noting the group of girls that was ogling him and Irvine. He smiled at them lazily, not really giving the act a second thought, as if it was entirely natural to him.

Seifer could play his charm like other people did cards.

_'Some things never change.'_

The cowboy led him through a maze of hallways, up a flight of stairs and past one of the two school cafeterias.

"Just so ya know, I _really_ don't recommend ya eat there," Irvine advised his new classmate, while pulling his face into a grimace.

Seifer turned to him with interest and lilted, "Oh, really?"

"Well... my buddy Zell really digs their hot dogs," the cowboy continued. "Not that that's exactly saying much, ya know. Zell isn't exactly what you'd call a picky eater. In fact, he'll eat just about anything that's _dead_ or not up in the trees by the count of three. And even then..."

He performed a vague gesture with his hand.

"Where do you get your lunch, then?" Seifer interrupted. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't exactly strike me as the kinda guy who'd bring a lunchbox from mommy."

"Oh, hell no. My mom's a vegetarian. Fuck that, man. We go to this place across the street, 'Ward's Diner.' It's pretty decent. There's this really cute chick that works there..."

Seifer sighed. Why had he seen this coming?

"Ain't that a shocker," the blond purred sarcastically.

"Dude, she's really cute! Seriously. I totally dig her. She won't give me her phone number, though. I think she likes to play hard to get, know what I'm sayin'? I've asked the ice princess to help me out, but I think he just flipped me off. He kinda does that a lot, actually."

Irvine rubbed at his chin, apparently trying to revive the unpleasant memory.

"Ice princess... talkin' about Squall, or what's-his-face?" Seifer asked with a bored inflection.

In reality, the blond couldn't keep his interest from perking up at the mentioning of Squall's nickname, because frankly, that grumpy looking brunette biker had been quite on his mind, though Seifer wasn't all too happy about it. He had sworn to himself (and to his parents - about two dozen times and then some) that he would _not_ start anything with a guy this year. That kinda stuff would unfortunately have to wait until college, when people cared less about what he did on his private time. Not that he had any desire to repeat the drama he had been forced to deal with at Balamb High, anyway.

Still - against all odds, Squall Leonhart had managed to elicit his curiosity.

"Yup, that's the one. Squall works at 'Ward's' after school. Don't think his folks exactly _need_ the money, you know, but maybe he just enjoys working his ass off," Irvine explained with an abject grunt and a careless shrug to match. "You know, the chicks really dig him and his silent act, don't ask me why."

_'No, really? Shocker. Couldn't be because the guy is hot as shit, could it?'_

Of course Seifer didn't voice his sarcasm, nor did he give any signs of caring much for Irvine's information on the Leonhart kid. The cowboy was obviously straight as an arrow, and Seifer knew better than to hint at his own, somewhat diverse sexuality.

Eventually, Irvine ushered him into a brightly lit room, and Seifer only assumed that this was their respective math classroom. His emerald eyes roved over numerous seats, most of which were already occupied. He received more than just one curious look-over, but he didn't mind. He was used to being ogled by his fellow classmates. He had mastered the art of handling them long ago. He'd flirt just enough to keep the girls interested and the guys on his side. Rarely ever did he take it too far.

Those times that he _had_, he remembered and kept as lessons well learned. When it came to romance, Seifer Almasy never made the same mistake twice.

Not that he usually bothered with second attempts.

Irvine plopped down in one of the hard plastic chairs, immediately striking up a flirty conversation with a curly haired blonde girl in front of him. Seifer sighed a cynical "_imagine that_" and glanced around the room, scanning it for vacant seats. He spotted an empty one in the back, which suited him just fine. As his gaze swerved to the left and right of it, inspecting his prospective neighbors, he couldn't help but let out a sound of surprise.

Sitting next to the window, gazing disjointedly out into the yard, was Seifer's ill-tempered brunette freeway encounter. The boy had taken off his leather jacket and smoothed it over the back of his chair, which he was balancing on its hind legs. His motorcycle helmet was resting on the window sill, not quite out of his reach. His shirt was plain, thin, long-sleeved and black.

Seifer had to hand it to him - Squall Leonhart pulled the rogue biker look off like he owned it.

Hoisting a self-assured smirk upon his face, Seifer confidently made his way to his chosen seat. He had passed about two or three tables, when something small and loud suddenly landed before his feet with a loud clatter. Seifer halted in his stride, looking down, both distracted and annoyed. Apparently, someone had dropped a baby blue tin pencil case to the floor, and it had spilled its contents all over the cream colored linoleum.

Coincidence?

Yeah, right.

He kneeled and casually collected the various pens to sort them back into their container. As he rose back up, he could almost feel their owner's gaze boring into him from the side.

She was easy on the eyes, he had to give her that. One of the prettiest girls he'd seen at this school by a long shot. A petite brunette with long hair that was interwoven with chunky auburn streaks and a finely featured face dominated by large, bambi brown eyes rimmed in black mascara. She was beaming up at him in rapture, crossing her legs and leaning backwards so he could get a full frontal of her low-cut white dress.

Suppressing a sigh over her obvious attempt at flirting with him, and forcing his irresistible smile back onto his face, he handed her the case.

"Hey - think this is your's."

She let out a high pitched giggle, nearly causing the hairs on the back of his neck to stand. Granted, he fancied girls too, but he had stopped bothering with the air-headed, ditzy barbie type a long time ago. A hot looking girlfriend (or a whole battalion of them, rather) came at a price he wasn't really interested in paying. Generally, girls of the brunette's caliber tended to be much too high in maintenance. Thus, it took him but a split-second to categorize this female specimen:

She definitely wasn't what he'd consider "dating" material. A one-night stand perhaps, considering she had a pretty face and a nice rack, but that was all he would accredit her with.

"Awww," she cooed, her voice annoying him on a deeper level. "Thank you! I'm like, such a klutz. You're new, right? What's your name?"

"Seifer. Seifer Almasy," he answered, carefully keeping up his vacant grin.

"I'm Rinoa Heartilly. Nice to meet you."

Her smile was sweeter than cotton candy.

He hated cotton candy.

"Nice meeting ya too, Rinoa," he said, his voice strained despite his efforts. "Well, I better go sit my ass down so I don't get detention right off the bat. That'd set a new record, even for me. See ya around."

She gave another one of those canned giggles, and he was relieved that he could walk away from her without seeming like a total dick. When he re-adjusted his focus to the back of the room, he was surprised to find Squall looking back at him. The brunette's features were curled with a look of faint disgust, and he didn't hold Seifer's gaze. As soon as the blond had caught his storm grey eyes, Squall shifted to his left and resumed staring out of the window as if it was the most interesting fucking view in the world.

_'Yeah, ice princess alright... or glacier queen, more like it. This oughta be a hoot.'_

Seifer sank down in his plastic seat with a creak and chucked his bag on the floor. Flicking his gaze to the side, he realized that Squall was still glaring out the window. The brunette's hands were placed palms-down upon his desk, and he was tapping his right index finger ever so subtly. Seifer noticed that he was wearing two broad, dark brown leather wristbands with silver clasps. In a way, he found that they looked almost like miniature belts. Seifer had seen similar ones in a Hot Topic catalog before, and he decided that they suited the brunette's carelessly handsome style pretty damn well.

"I like your wristbands, man," he declared loftily, his chin perched nonchalantly in his hand and his green eyes fixing the other teen attentively.

Squall turned with visible reluctance. His eyes were cold and hard as they connected with Seifer's, and he stopped tapping his finger. His contempt was almost palpable, and Seifer could feel how a chill settled over him like heavy mist. For just one moment, Seifer would have sworn on his life that this guy hated him from the very bottom of his heart.

But the moment passed, and the brunette reeled his head to the side again, away from Seifer's curious view. Before the blond could have said anything else, however, sudden noise at the front of the classroom immediately diverted his attention.

A woman had entered, and judging by her stunning appearance, she had to be the teacher that Irvine had been raving about. Her hair was straight and raven black, pinned to the back of her head in an intricate knot. She wore a dark purple, expensive looking designer costume that flaunted her long, ivory legs and fancy high heels, and her eyes were swirling with the startling golden hue of liquid amber.

Something about her was quite hypnotizing.

"Good morning, class."

Her voice was like a song, soft and powerful at the same time. She glanced around the room, smiling enigmatically as she placed a stack of papers neatly on her desk.

The red-headed guy who was sitting to Seifer's right heaved a dull, longing moan of male teenage desire.

Somehow, the pathetic sound tore Seifer out of his stupor, and he leaned back in his chair to assess the situation from a distance. Next to him, Squall was looking at Edea Kramer with stark disinterest, absent-mindedly fiddling with his left wristband. Seifer couldn't help but arch an eyebrow in bewilderment.

Did _anything_ faze this guy?

"Well... it's certainly nice to see you all back after such a long break," Edea said lightly. "And, if I'm not mistaken, we even have a new addition to our class."

Seifer's head whipped around to her at those words, and he grinned blankly. She had set her eyes upon him and was reciprocating his smile, though in a much more subtle and less dorky nature.

He was starting to feel like a total retard.

"Seifer Almasy, isn't it?" she asked softly. "The transfer student from Balamb City High School?"

"Yeah, Ma'am."

"No need for such formalities, Seifer," she replied and a quiet laugh swayed her voice. "My class calls me Edea."

"O-Okay. Edea. Uh, right on then."

To his left, Squall gave a low-pitched snort. Seifer glanced at him questioningly, but the brunette refused to meet his eye. He had grabbed a pen and notebook and begun to draw odd shapes on a blank piece of paper, totally engrossed in his own little world.

"What?" Seifer hissed under his breath, feeling angered. "What's so fuckin' funny, huh?"

He thought that he saw the corner of the brunette's mouth twitching slightly, but he wasn't entirely sure. Saying nothing in reply, Squall merely continued doodling, and his random shapes now started to resemble an animal of some sort.

"Hey, what are you drawin'?" the blond mumbled, as always quite easily distracted.

"Seifer?"

He flinched at the sound of Edea's voice, which was now drizzled with a faint hint of reproach. She had fixed her amber eyes upon him sternly while her hands were skimming through her papers. The rest of the class had turned their heads to watch him. Irvine was giving him an ecstatic thumbs-up.

"Yes, sorry?" Seifer answered hastily, trying to sound like the prime example of a teacher's pet.

"Tell me... have you talked with your counselor yet?"

"Oh, uh... yeah. She gave me a bunch of stuff for my classes... uh, stuff I was missing, I guess."

He shrugged. Indeed, he had sat down with a counselor some time during the summer, but he had never actually made the effort to study all the paperwork she had handed him. He much rather went running or swimming than spend his days inside brooding over notes and lame ass homework.

Needless to say, his grades reflected his study habits rather nicely.

"Very good," she purred. "If you have any troubles or questions about the syllabus, you can come see me after class, Seifer. Well, let's continue then, shall we?"

Seifer could feel his attention seeping away as he tried to listen to her words and understand the diagrams she was drawing on the dry erase board. Somehow, her earlier spell had lost its effect on him. She still looked ravishing and her rear view was pretty damn enticing, but for some reason, he found the silent brunette to his left a whole lot more fascinating.

Out of the corner of his eyes, he noticed how Squall's rudimentary sketch had turned into the large figure of a predator of sorts - a lion, Seifer guessed, judging by the extravagant mane. Seifer didn't know too much about art, but he could tell that this guy had talent. His linework was smooth and detailed, flawless almost. It looked like he had never bothered to use an eraser in his entire life.

By then, Seifer's previous anger had completely ebbed away. On the contrary, that brat named Squall had definitely caught his interest. Seifer was anxious to talk to the brunette and get to know his frigid ass a little better (however closely he could, really...). There was something unusual about that dark haired biker, although Seifer couldn't really say what it was. Squall didn't look at all like the troublesome, borderline-criminal posse Seifer usually surrounded himself with - on the contrary, the brunette actually seemed surprisingly cool and collected for his age (well, save for his road rage, perhaps). Clearly, he was the type of guy that could keep anyone's attention without doing anything special at all.

"Squall, can you tell me the answer?"

Seifer started when Edea Kramer jarred him yet again from his reveries. He had paid no attention to her whatsoever, and he was quite sure that Squall hadn't, either. After all, the brunette had looked rather engrossed in the progress of his drawing. Now, the dark haired youth looked up from his work to meet his teacher's gaze, but he didn't put his pen aside.

"Square root of z over 5xy," Squall replied flatly, his voice monotone and bored.

"Mh-hm, that's correct. Very good, Squall."

The brunette gave neither a physical nor vocal response to her praise. He simply returned his eyes to his notebook and promptly resumed to work on his lion's shape. Seifer's face crumpled wryly in awe. He hadn't even _heard_ Edea's question, let alone could have guessed the answer, and Squall had whipped it up as if there had been absolutely nothing to it.

Who _was_ this kid?

"That was pretty damn smooth, wise guy," he muttered into Squall's direction, deliberately making it sound like a compliment. "Considering you weren't even paying any attention and all. You are one multi-tasking lil bastard, my friend."

Squall's pen paused briefly on its flight over the paper, as if the brunette was actually considering to give a reply to Seifer's comment, but then he opted for fashionable silence once more.

A real people person, wasn't he just?

It was beginning to irritate Seifer.

"Jesus, what's the matter with you, anyway? Did you swallow your fucking tongue somewhere on the way to class, or what?" the blond snapped, the bite of sarcasm in his voice a bit sharper than he had intended. "Or did someone else do it for you?"

For some reason, that comment elicited more than just a small break in Squall's fluid movements. The brunette's head jerked up, and he glared at Seifer with openly displayed hostility. There was something raw and dangerous flashing in those steel blue eyes of his - something that alerted Seifer instantly that he had struck some kind of nerve.

The blond edged back slightly, suddenly feeling uneasy without knowing how or why. He wasn't scared by any means, but Squall's death glare had caused him to pause.

Maybe screwing with this guy wasn't such a good idea, after all. Obviously, there was something not quite right with that kid.

"Nevermind, I was just -"

"Go fuck yourself."

The insult had come hard, rough and low, completely out of left field. Seifer blinked. He certainly hadn't seen this one coming. Squall hadn't spoken very loudly, but his voice had been sharp as a razor's edge. The girl in front of him turned and frowned disapprovingly at both of them.

Seifer didn't care.

"What'd ya say?" he hissed, his body tensing for a fight.

"You heard me, asshole!"

"You need a fuckin' attitude adjustment, you little shit!" Seifer snarled, his hands crushing to fists on top of his table, ready to strike a blow. "What the fuck is your problem, huh?"

Squall set down his pen harshly, nearly throwing it to the ground, and Seifer could see that his hands were shaking as he was clearly considering launching himself at the blond across from him.

"Now, now, what's going on back here, boys?"

Edea had walked up to their desks, her gorgeous features screwed into a mask of discontentment. Seifer forced himself to steady - he hadn't intended on getting into trouble on his very first day at school, but this stupid fucking fairy was pushing all the wrong buttons. Why the hell had the brunette snapped at him like that? Honestly, it seemed completely uncalled-for. After all, Seifer had only been messing around.

_'Touchy little bitch, ain't he? Must be on his fuckin' period or something. Fuckin' hey, man, I didn't even do anything!'_

Next to him, the brunette was clenching his jaw in anger and avoiding Edea's demanding, impatient eyes. He wasn't going to explain their verbal banter to the teacher, Seifer understood that much. It'd be on him to fix this, although he considered no part of this dumb confrontation to be his fault.

"Nothing," the blond finally mumbled, his voice grating with strain. "Sorry about that."

Her frown didn't fade, and she turned to look at Squall instead. The dark haired teen's eyes seemed oddly unfocused. He was staring straight through her rather than at her, but eventually, he forced himself to nod stiffly.

"Of course..." Edea said calmly, her disbelief evident in the words as she blew out a curt sigh. "Well, in that case, I assume you two will actually be quiet from now on."

She turned, not waiting for an answer, knowing perfectly well that she would receive none. Seifer followed her graceful stride with his eyes, before he turned to glare at his desk neighbor. Squall had resumed drawing, but his features were tight and his expression unreadable. He was pressing his pen down upon the paper so hard that Seifer could see the tendons of his right hand jerking beneath the skin. The brunette wasn't heeding him with a single glance.

_'Dumb, psycho little piece of shit. Fuck you. Be that way then. See what I care.'_

Seifer spent the rest of the class in stubborn, frustrated silence, refusing to look at Squall just one more time. The brunette himself seemed quite content with that arrangement, and continued to ignore his new classmate in the same annoying manner that he had adopted right from the start.

It took another long and boring hour before the school bell finally heralded the end of the lesson. Seifer sighed a mute "thank you, dear fucking god" at the merciful sound, and he leaped upon his feet to collect his notebooks and follow the other students, who were already filing out of the room. He saw the ditzy girl, Rinoa, chattering incessantly with her blonde, curly haired friend, and as Seifer went to walk past them, the dark haired female promptly grabbed his arm.

"Hey, Seifer, wait," she chirped and begun to fiddle with a silver pendant laced around her slender neck, as if to seem coy. "Listen... Michelle and I were wondering whether you'd wanna go to the club with us and a few friends on Friday night?"

"Oi! Can I come?" Irvine piped up. "Please? Pretty please? C'mon, I'm a good dancer! You know you wanna see my _moves_, baby!"

Rinoa studied the eager cowboy critically for a moment, before she nodded in a hesitant gesture of approval.

"Sure Irvy, why not? Just as long as your new, handsome friend Seifer here comes along, too..."

The tone of her voice was blatantly seductive enough to make Seifer choke, but he kept a straight face all the same. Out of the very corner of his eyes, he could see Squall shrugging into his jacket, his pale face apparently incapable of displaying any type of emotion other than annoyance. For some weird reason, though, Seifer could tell that the brunette youth was listening to their conversation.

Instantaneously, his lips smoothed into a calculated, lascivious smirk.

"Come on, how could I ever say no to a pretty girl like you?" he leered at Rinoa. "I'm totally game. Just name the time and place and I'll be there."

"Great!" she replied, bouncing on her heels. "Why don't you give me your phone number so I can call you?"

"Sure thing. Have a piece of paper? I know you've got plenty of pens, sweetheart."

She laughed falsely at his stupid joke, and Seifer could feel his insides churning. Was he really agreeing to a date with the class bimbo for the off-chance of possibly pissing Squall Leonhart off?

How bizarre.

He bent over slightly, scribbling his number upon a pink post-it that she had placed upon her desk. He caught a faint whiff of something that smelled vaguely like cinnamon when Squall pushed past him, walked through the rows of disarrayed tables and finally out the door, not turning around once. Seifer tried to concentrate on his sloppy handwriting rather than the thought of the grouchy brunette, but as he handed Rinoa the note with a weak half-smirk, he couldn't shake off the feeling that he had done everything wrong.

* * *

Disclaimer: I don't own Hot Topic (Duh?)


	3. Lessons Learned

-:-**  
Chapter 3  
Lessons Learned**

_"Just concern yourself with the fact that I do care."_

-:-

During the few minutes before the beginning of his next class, Seifer had exchanged his backpack for his gym bag and scarfed down a chocolate flavored protein bar he had brought from home. Irvine had pointed him into the general direction of the changing rooms, and he had happily informed him that he was going to his choir class, for "all the cute girls take choir lessons." Of course, Irvine couldn't really sing to save his own life. Seifer had merely chuckled at the hormonal cowboy, too preoccupied to even properly make fun of the guy. Honestly, the athletic blond was looking forward to gym class; it would provide for some well-needed distraction.

The guys' locker room was a little off the beaten tracks, and it took Seifer a while before he finally spotted it at the end of a long, narrow hallway. He pushed the door to it ajar, entering a small, white-tiled room in which the air was heavy with the sting of sweat. A few guys were already undressing and slipping into their gym outfits, but Seifer paid them no mind. He dropped his bag on one of the many wooden benches and gave his respective locker a scrutinizing look-over. It appeared to be fully functional, unlike some that he had come across on his trips to other schools for football games and the like.

Humming quietly to himself, he sorted his shorts, shirt and sneakers onto the bench. Then, he glanced at some dark haired student that had been eyeing him curiously from the other side of the room for a few minutes now.

"Hey," Seifer said, a husky, pleasant growl to his voice. "Any idea what we'll be doing today?"

The boy stopped weaving brand new laces through the holes in his shoes and nodded, an air of vanity and importance surrounding him.

"Actually, yes, I do. We'll be doing track. Lots of running, you know?"

"... You don't say," Seifer replied with a grunt, and his face soured.

Smartass.

He wasn't an all-state track runner for no reason, thank you very much.

"Erh..." the brunette continued, "Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you the new guy?"

For some weird reason, he seemed a bit upset that Seifer hadn't introduced himself right away.

Like the blond honestly hadn't had anything better to do.

"Yep, that'd be me," Seifer nodded reluctantly.

"Ah, neat. My name's Nida."

"Seifer."

"Pleasure."

The boy named Nida smiled politely and resumed lacing his dark blue sneakers while Seifer finished changing. The blond looked over his shoulder when Nida closed his locker door with a clatter and went to file out of the room behind a group of other guys.

"I'll see you outside, then," Nida declared airily. "Welcome to Deling City High's senior class!"

Seifer cocked a brow and nodded vaguely, not quite sure what to make of the pompous brunette. He figured that he had just met their future Valedictorian or something despicable along those lines. Quietly, he sat down on his bench, short tresses of blond hair falling into his face as he bent down to tie his laces. Somewhere behind another row of lockers, towards the back of the room, someone was slamming their door shut with an ear-splitting bang.

_'Fuck, dude, why don't you just go and tear the damn thing out of the wall while you're at it? Sounds like someone needs to see anger management.'_

He rolled his eyes and cast a quick glance up, curious to see the guy that put so much force into storing away his belongings. He could hear the other's footsteps on the tiled floor, the rubber of his soles grinding on the coarse stone surface.

A lean-framed dark haired male emerged from behind the dividing wall of lockers, and he moved quickly towards the door. Seifer caught only a glimpse of unruly brown hair, black shorts and a white, long-sleeved t-shirt, before he finally realized who _exactly_ he was looking at.

_'Oh man... no fuckin' way.'_

Yup, sure enough, he had managed to land himself in yet another class with the ice princess, paving the way for probably yet another run-in that could get him chucked into detention.

Fucking excellent.

Squall eventually halted in his stride, feeling Seifer's ominous gaze on himself. Slowly, the dark haired teen uncrossed his arms from before his chest and looked to the side. He actually met the blond's eyes this time, but his expression was faraway - completely unreadable. Seifer, meanwhile, raised up quickly to make use of this rare opportunity to study the brunette more closely.

The guy was kinda on the thin side, he thought, though he still managed to look obnoxiously enticing. His legs in those black dry-fit shorts were long and muscled tightly. A decent runner, perhaps, though Seifer had his doubts. Squall's stride seemed a bit too stiff and erratic overall. He had laid off the leather bands, but his wrists were taped up tightly with white athlete's tape - both of them. Weak ligaments, most likely.

For a moment, Seifer considered saying something.

Of course, when given the choice between a swift retreat and the prospect of casual conversation, Squall Leonhart would never opt for the latter. He avoided any kind of social interaction with other students on a daily basis, apparently eager to do his nickname great justice. Honestly, he didn't care for friendship or even the occasional acquaintance; he wasn't going to school to be sociable. All that he wanted was to be left alone, and he couldn't have been any less bothered for the people around him.

This blond dickhole in front of him was no exception.

He had identified Seifer as a cocky, careless snob the moment he had first laid eyes on him on the road. Some arrogant prick in an expensive truck and a stupid football varsity jacket who deemed himself something special - the typical, pea-brained jock who thought he somehow deserved to have his stupid ass kissed.

With an audible snort and a condescending grimace that was dripping with attitude, Squall turned around, and he was out of the door before Seifer could have done so much as blink an eyelash.

Bending over again, the blond folded his laces into a loose knot and jerked them tight while his brows mashed together.

"Stuck up bitch."

He hurled his clothes into his locker and slammed the door shut no less violently than Squall had done only seconds before him. Seifer was angry, and he didn't even exactly know why. All he knew was that the touchy little ice princess had better behave himself, because his patience with the brunette was starting to run dangerously thin.

Seifer took this kinda shit from no one.

He left the changing room and jogged down the hallway, out of the door and into the athletics court. He could see the outline of Squall's figure against the cloudless blue sky, walking up to a group of students that had huddled on the track ring. Seifer followed him, and he wasn't surprised to see the brunette halt a little ways off to the side of the main crowd, which consisted of males only.

Seifer examined the area with great interest. He loved running, and this track court was fucking marvelous. Apparently, the running tracks had been freshly paved, because the coarse orange material beneath his shoes was hardly specked with dirt. He scraped at it with his heels, only looking up at the sudden sound of a deep, authoritarian voice.

"Is everyone finally here now? Good. Took you ladies long enough."

Seifer hadn't even noticed the tall, dark-skinned man in the black tracksuit at the front of the group. He looked to be in his mid-to-late thirties, very slim, and blessed with an exotically attractive face. The kind of teacher that the girls flipped for. His long, black hair had been woven into intricate braids, and it was cascading down his back like water. His gaze was as dark and opaque as black tar, but his eyes were sharp like those of a hawk. The man screened his students for a while, pausing only briefly as he passed over Seifer.

"Since it's been almost three months that most of you have seen a track ring up close, I'd say three laps sound good for starters," he declared, smiling faintly at his students' complaints. "Yes, yes, I know, it's breaking my heart, too. Go on now, go on."

Seifer was mildly surprised at the abrupt manner in which their teacher was commencing the lesson. Raking his memory, he tried to remember the man's name.

_'Seagul. Kiros Seagul. Right, he's the track coach, too. Go figure.'_

Next to him, Squall had sped off for his first lap, apparently familiar with Seagul's teaching habits. He left most of the other guys in the dust, causing Seifer to rectify at least parts of his earlier impression of the frigid brunette.

The bitch could run.

"Seifer?"

The blond pivoted on the spot, blinking at his teacher who had approached him almost silently. The man was studying him closely with those black eyes of his, as if there was something in particular that he was looking for.

Seifer wondered what it was, and whether or not he had found it.

"Yeah?" he answered blankly.

"I'm Kiros, the school's track coach," the man explained unnecessarily. "Director Cid told me you were interested in joining the team?"

"Eh, yeah, I guess so," Seifer replied, caught slightly off-guard. "I was kinda debating between track and football..."

"Well, it's up to you, of course," Kiros replied with a casual inflection. "If you feel like stopping by, though, practice is each Monday, Wednesday and Friday after school. Competitions are usually on Saturdays. We always meet out here for practice. Once the weather gets bad, we'll train indoors. Just come by and check it out."

"Alright. I'll do that. Thanks."

"No problem. I know you're good, you were part of the all-state selection last year. You'd be an asset for the team."

"Okay... I'll think about it, if that's alright with you."

"Sure," Seagul nodded. "Let me know what you decide by the end of the week."

"I will."

"Well, better get going then. The others are almost done with their first lap."

"Oh... right."

Indeed, Squall and the other guys at the head of the group were approaching the start of their second round. Without much hesitation, Seifer decided to join them.

He jogged up behind the brunette and three other students from his class, setting a moderate pace for the time being. Frankly, he hadn't trained much over the summer holidays; all in all, he'd been too busy recovering from the royal mess back home at Balamb High, when one of the guys he had fucked had ratted him out to the entire school as gay. Needless to say, the whole thing hadn't exactly been a walk in the park.

_'Fucking drama, man. All of that, just because he got his feelings hurt. No wonder I never bothered to maintain an exclusive relationship with anyone. Fuck that shit. Holy fuckin' psycho-ness.'_

"-princess is running again. Look at him go. Run, little princess, run."

_'... Huh?'_

Seifer's head streaked up in confusion when he heard someone laughing nastily in front of him. The guy was dark haired, about his height and size, perhaps smaller, and his angular face was tight with jeer. The two blond boys squiring his sides were laughing as they studied the target of their friend's remark.

Seifer's eyes narrowed when he understood who they were talking to.

"Come on princess, what's up? Don't wanna talk? Aww, that hurts my little heart, ya know."

Squall didn't turn his head an inch as he was running, grimly trying to focus onto the rhythm of his own breathing instead of the insults snarled at him by one of his classmates. He was staring straight ahead with empty eyes, down the long, wide curve of the track. The brunette had been through this before, countless times, and he knew that he could ignore them.

At least for a little while.

After that, it was just a matter of cutting his losses.

"How's your daddy dear, princess? Same old crook as ever? Fucking people over as usual?"

Squall bit his lips, refusing to respond to the insults in any other way. It was all he could do but hate with his entire being, and hope that this bill, which had never been _his_ in the first place, would eventually be paid.

"So, tell me... Did ya have a nice summer vacation, princess?" the guy continued snickering, the unkind nickname streaking every single one of his sentences. "D'ya play lots with yourself? Well, whatever it is you've _got_ to play with, anyway."

Behind them, Seifer noticed Squall's hands tightening to fists, but the brunette kept jogging at the same pace, neither slowing down nor speeding up. Honestly, he was doing a remarkable job at ignoring his attackers.

Seifer, meanwhile, made sure to stick to the dark haired biker's tail, just listening and watching for the time being.

"Doubt he knows how, Jeff," one of the lackeys chortled, amused by his own lame joke. "Lil' Princess Prude. Just look at him. He's prolly still waiting for his Prince Charming to come and steal away his virginity."

"Heh. See, if you're a good girl, princess, I'll let you practice on me for a bit," the bully named Jeff offered foully, moving closer to Squall. "I heard you're into that. In fact, I heard you get your rocks off by servicing other dudes. Ain't that right, princess?"

Seifer's stomach coiled with disgust at Jeff's cruel, demeaning words. Sadly, none of the insults were particularly unfamiliar to him. Memories of a not-so-distant past that he'd rather forgotten were inevitably pushing to the surface, and they managed to make even someone as stoic as Seifer very angry, very fast.

"C'mon, you know you want to," the bully taunted. "Today after school, behind the gym, just you, me and my dick... Hmm? How about it, princess?"

"I'd rather piss glass, asshole," Squall finally bit back, his voice pure steel as he coolly flipped the bully the bird in mid-run. "Go fuck yourself."

Seifer hadn't anticipated the brunette's quick-tongued response, and apparently, neither had Jeff. The brawny teen gave an angry hiss, and his steps stumbled slightly as he tried to maintain his pace.

"Oh, you think you're something special, don't ya, fucking bitch?" the dark haired bully barked furiously. "I'll show ya fucking special, _cunt_!"

Before Seifer could have interfered, Jeff had extended his left foot and stuck it between Squall's legs. Seifer could see the brunette struggling to stay on his feet as he was losing his balance, but Squall had been running too fast to be able to remain standing. He fell hard as his ankle twisted and his knees buckled - and falling on turf was never, ever a pleasant experience.

Seifer immediately came to a screeching halt. The bullies had slowed down as well, if only to relish the image of Squall crouching on the ground with chafed skin and an obviously busted ankle. The brunette's face was screwed into a pained frown as he curled one hand tightly around his left foot and hissed a few silent curses.

"Hey! _Fuckface_! What the _fuck_ is the matter with you?"

The guys turned at the sound of Seifer's pissed off voice, and confusion quickly meshed with the sneer in their eyes.

"Uh, and just who the hell are _you_?" Jeff huffed, drawing up his shoulders as if to look intimidating.

Seifer stepped closer, consciously positioning himself between Squall and his adversaries. He caught a glimpse of the brunette's perplexed face, and he noticed how the brunette followed him with his gaze, a stunned look of incredulity now pushing onto his features.

"I'll be the guy with his fist in your ugly mug if you don't back the hell away from him," Seifer growled, grimacing at the three boys as he cracked his knuckles. "And I mean right the fuck _now._"

"Whoa, dude, c'mon, take a fuckin' chill pill," the smaller of the lackeys mumbled, apparently less brave than their leader.

"I saw what you did," the blond snarled. "Don't even think about telling me to chill, dipshit! I'll have your balls on a silver fuckin' platter, you understand that?"

"Oh, so you think you saw something, huh? And what exactly do you think you're gonna do about it?" Jeff asked crudely, and his voice held a primitive note of warning.

Little did he know that Seifer wasn't impressed by so-called "warnings." The blond was prepared to do whatever it took to show these ignorant assholes their rightful place, and for the moment being, he really didn't care too much about the consequences.

Punching their stupid faces in sounded like the kind of fun that was worth a few hours of detention.

"Hey..." the other lackey suddenly piped up, his tone strangely thoughtful. "Wait a minute. I remember you. Aren't you that Seifer Almasy guy? All-state Galbadia football or something?"

"Damn fuckin' straight I am," Seifer hissed, now motioning the boys towards himself with his right hand. "C'mon, I know you want a piece of me, you little shitheads!"

The recognition of Seifer's obvious tackling abilities seemed to make the guys ponder - a concept that was wondrous all in itself. Seifer could practically see the little wheels milling behind their foreheads as they were debating their options. Messing with someone Squall's size was one thing, this huge blond guy, however...

Well, let's just say it didn't strike them as such a clever idea.

"But... Fuck, then what do you even _care_?" Jeff inquired placidly, demonstratively jabbing his chin in Squall's direction. "Did you even take a look at him? He's just a dumb lil punk with a big mouth that needs a proper dose of shut the fuck up. Why the hell would someone like _you _bother?"

Seifer didn't have to think long on that one. Granted, he'd been beyond aggravated with Squall for his bitchy attitude, which had been completely uncalled for, but Seifer also possessed a great sense of righteousness. He had once been a real asshole and bully himself at some point in his high school career, but he had learned a lot throughout the previous months - much more than he had ever wanted to know.

Being ridiculed and treated like shit was no fun at all, especially when the "jokes" were aimed below the belt line.

"Just concern yourself with the fact that I _do_ care," Seifer thus responded coldly. "Try 'shutting him up' just one more time and you'll be collecting your teeth off the fuckin' turf one by one. Got that?"

Jeff had no chance to give a reply of any kind, because he had finally taken notice of the fact that Kiros had come running up behind them, his face stern.

"Hey! What's going on here? What happened?" Kiros demanded, his voice sharp enough to cut glass.

"They-" Seifer started, before he found himself abruptly cut off.

"_Shut up_."

Seifer blinked, entirely dumbfounded by that unexpected command, and he slowly veered around. Squall was still sitting on the ground, though he was struggling to get back on his feet despite his sprained ankle. His knees and the outside of his right thigh were a mess, scraped down to where his skin was oozing a thin layer of blood. Seifer figured that it probably hurt like fuck, and he noticed that Squall looked almost embarrassed, but that in itself definitely didn't explain why the brunette had ordered him to keep his mouth shut.

"I tripped," Squall lied, exchanging a minute, warning glance with Seifer before he looked at Kiros. "... Sorry."

Of course, Kiros Seagul was far from oblivious. He had heard Squall's hissed command to Seifer, and he had seen the wordless caution in his eyes. This wasn't the first time that something similar involving Jeff and Squall had happened, but as it was almost tradition, the quiet brunette wouldn't tell a word. Unfortunately, Kiros himself hadn't seen what had come to pass, and it was difficult to punish students without a communicative witness. Looking at Seifer, the new guy, it was obvious that he had seen _something_, but Squall had silenced the fool all too effectively.

It was a pity, and their childish ignorance and pride angered Kiros like nothing else.

"_Tripped_?" he repeated icily.

"Yeah," Squall affirmed, somehow managing to keep a straight face. "It's nothing."

Kiros studied the boys very closely as he bent down to examine Squall's left ankle, which had begun to swell up slightly. Jeff and his loyal cronies, Chris and Mike, were sporting their most innocent expressions. Fucking little angels, if he'd ever seen any. Kiros frowned. Honestly, he should have expected as much. Squall was flashing him his poker face, as usual, giving away nothing. The dark haired boy knew perfectly well that Jeff would only continue to terrorize him if he didn't talk and put an end to this, but it almost seemed to Kiros as if Squall didn't even care. Honestly, it was ridiculous how much bullying the boy was putting up with so willingly. The only one who seemed mildly unsettled by the situation was Seifer, but the blond was forcing himself to look unperturbed, and kept his mouth shut against his better knowledge.

It was pointless. Always had been. These boys would rather die than rat one another out, no matter how much they hated each other.

"I see," Kiros said sourly when he stood up, making it blaringly evident that he did not believe one word the brunette had said. "Very well. You definitely won't be running any more today, Squall. Seifer, take him to the infirmary, please."

Seifer nodded hesitantly. He looked at Squall, whose features were dragged in agony at the mere idea of being in close proximity to the blond.

"I'm fine. I can walk on my own," the dark haired teen tried quickly, while pushing himself onto his feet.

He couldn't help but wince at the pain that was jabbing in his left ankle as he stood, and he shifted his weight immediately.

"Yes, I can see that," Kiros replied with a sarcastic drawl. "Give it up. Seifer's going with you. Come on, get a move on, boys! ... And you guys had better keep running, if you don't want to spend your afternoon cleaning the track equipment!"

Seifer hadn't even noticed the small crowd of fellow students that had gathered all around them. Nobody was jogging anymore, curiosity clearly having gotten the better of them. They quickly took off at their teacher's order though, because they all knew fully well that Kiros was a man whose temper was lethal once aroused. He doled out detentions like no other.

"Come back once you dropped him off, Seifer," Kiros ordered. "I'll check on you after class, Squall."

And with that, he walked off.

Feeling slightly at a loss, Seifer studied his respective "task", trying to figure out the best way to tackle it. Squall heeded him with a glare out of narrow grey eyes that could have frozen hell over. He was, more or less, balancing his weight on one leg, trying to rest his injured ankle without looking overly ridiculous.

"Right... uh... Well, I guess you better put your arm around my shoulder or somethin'," Seifer suggested with a helpless shrug, scratching his head.

Squall's expression made it awfully clear that he wasn't planning on putting _anything_ around anybody. Seifer sighed, feeling a wave of irritation taking him over once more. Honestly, what was this kid's deal? It wasn't like he had expected the brunette to leap into his arms and tearfully label him his hero or anything, but he had hoped that Squall would at least be civil towards him from now on, considering that Seifer had just saved his sorry ass from those three bullies. Sadly, Squall didn't look remotely willing to do anything of the like.

Finally, Seifer got fed up with it. He'd been appointed with this task, and he was going to see it through, whether Squall was glaring at him like he wanted to dismember him or not. Brusquely, he marched up to the brunette and grabbed his left arm to lace it around his own shoulder. At the same time, he snaked his right arm around Squall's waist, immediately feeling the brunette clamming up and trying to make a break for it. Unfortunately for the smaller boy, Seifer was using his advantage in strength and weight all too wisely, and there was nowhere for Squall to go.

As the stubborn brunette continued to struggle, Seifer tilted his head down to bring his mouth close to the other youth's ear. Tresses of the shorter boy's chocolate brown hair brushed against his nose, and he suddenly caught a whiff of Squall's shampoo, which smelled like apples with a hint of cinnamon.

_'Cinnamon and apples, huh... hmm, fuck, he smells pretty damn good...'_

Suppressing a ravished sigh over Squall's tempting scent, Seifer quickly forced himself to snap out of it.

"Listen, you want me to tell him what _really_ happened?" the blond hissed suggestively, motioning in Kiros' direction.

Squall froze on the spot, and Seifer could hear how he sucked in a quick breath.

"Yeah. Didn't think so," the blond cooed sweetly into the brunette's ear, inevitably sending a chill down Squall's spine. "Let's get a move on then, shall we?"

The brunette was still stiff like a board in his hold, but at least he quit trying to weasel his way out of Seifer's arms. For the time being, the brawny blond was satisfied with that small measure of victory. He took a tentative step towards the school building, relieved to find Squall following his lead.

They walked slowly, their bodies melting together for the sake of necessity alone. Truthfully, it was one of the most awkward situations that Seifer had ever found himself in. Squall's body was rigid against Seifer's, every one of his intricately sculpted muscles tight like wires. He hardly placed any of his weight on the blond's shoulder, and his stride was accordingly erratic.

"Look, I think you're kinda missing the purpose of this," Seifer eventually declared with a grunt of exasperation. Then, he curled his hand tightly around Squall's left wrist and hoisted him further onto himself with one abrupt motion.

He had, however, by no means anticipated the brunette's response to that maneuver.

"Ouch!"

Squall yelped in shock and let out an aborted gasp of pain. He tripped over his own feet as he tried to get away from Seifer, wincing yet again at the pain that seared through his ankle when his foot hit the ground.

Seifer immediately let go of his wrist when noticed the other boy's reaction, but he continued to support Squall's body by the waist. He could feel the brunette drawing fast, shallow breaths, and for the very first time, he looked like he was genuinely in pain.

"Shit, I'm sorry! You okay?" Seifer asked, sounding concerned.

He cocked his head down to study Squall's face, but it was obscured by a curtain of dark hair. The brunette's pale neck was clammy, spangled with tiny beads of sweat. He honestly looked like shit. Nevertheless, the brunette nodded stiffly, though Seifer could still feel his body shaking.

"What's the matter? You, like... have problems with your joints or something?" the older boy finally asked, trying not to sound too nosy.

Again, just the faintest of nods and the sensation of Squall pulling away from him as far as he could.

"Damn, I'm sorry. I should have figured, since you taped them up..." the blond said, regret swaying his words. "I'm sorry. Really. I didn't mean to hurt you, I swear."

For the first time since they had left the track ring, Squall raised his voice. It sounded coarse and tight, and he was struggling to keep it from cracking.

"... It's fine."

After sucking in a deep breath and willing himself to steady, Squall continued hobbling towards the door to the school building, determined to get this over with as quickly as possible. Seifer couldn't shake off the impression that Squall was merely trying to cut the subject short, but he paced himself with the brunette all the same. Squall's lean frame had become even more static in his arms, and beneath his hand, he could feel the brunette flinching every time he took a step.

Though it bothered him slightly that he was so concerned about the boy who had barely spoken five words to him so far, Seifer just couldn't help but worry.

"Hey... What was that all about, anyway?" he asked, if only for the sake of getting rid of the uncomfortable silence between them. "The three fuckin' stooges, I mean. What did they want from you?"

"None of your business," Squall shot back defensively.

"Actually, I believe it is," Seifer disagreed stubbornly.

"I don't care what you believe," the brunette growled callously, "So get it out of your system."

Seifer could tell by the harsh undertone in Squall's voice that this matter was a final one. The elusive brunette wasn't going to let any details on the strange incident slip, that much Seifer had already figured out. The dark haired boy was an oddly secretive little thing, and sadly, it only made Squall more intriguing to him.

_'Yeah, but in a dumb, frustrating kinda way. What's his fuckin' deal? What the hell have I gotten myself into here?'_

Finally, after several minutes of hobbling around together and feeling suitably ridiculous, the two of them had reached the door to the main school building. Seifer pushed it open with one hand, assisting Squall inside. Once they had entered the building, the blond looked up and down the empty hallway, uncertain of where to go next.

"So, where's the infirmary?" he asked, glancing at Squall.

"Down that way and to the left."

"...'Kay."

As they were walking in the direction that Squall had pointed out, Seifer continued to ponder the brunette's unexpected presence in his life. He didn't even really know how he had ended up getting involved with the ill-tempered little sociopath, but he figured that perhaps the two of them had started off on an entirely wrong note.

Perhaps this little moment of privacy was a great opportunity to set things right between them, and perhaps even start over.

Not that it was of any real importance or anything, but he considered it worth a marginal amount of effort, anyway.

"Hey, listen... you and I kinda got off on the wrong foot, didn't we?" Seifer suggested with a casual, almost apologetic grin, though he knew that the brunette couldn't see the gesture.

Squall was a few inches shorter than him, and he made sure to keep his head stubbornly low. Seifer could only gaze at the patch of ivory skin on the brunette's neck when he craned his head around, and though the view wasn't necessarily beneficial in his current situation, he found it no less enticing. Focusing proved indeed to be slightly difficult when he had his arm around something so fucking delectable looking.

"I didn't mean to be a dick or anything, you know," Seifer continued almost hastily, but already felt like he could as well have struck up a conversation with a brick wall. "It's just weird coming to a new school your senior year. Guess I was feeling kinda pissed off at the world, you know what I mean?"

If Squall cared for his words, he definitely didn't bother to show it. His arm was slack on Seifer's shoulder, and he stared at the linoleum to his feet. Deep down, he wanted to snort with laughter at the blond's words, but he couldn't bring himself to. He knew why the two of them had butted heads in the first place; it had been just as much his fault as it had been Seifer's, and perhaps even more so his own. He didn't like people in general, and he liked males even less. Admittedly, this one seemed alright enough at a closer look, but didn't they always before they fucked you over?

_:: "Just concern yourself with the fact that I do care." ::_

_''Care'? Care my fucking ass. I've heard it all before. This is nothing but bullshit.'_

"This is it," Squall said flatly.

Seifer looked up at the white door in front of them. He was mildly disappointed when he realized that Squall had completely ignored his apology, but frankly, it wasn't like he had expected much of a response in the first place.

Thus, the blond simply pushed the door open and ushered Squall inside. The nurse's office was small and sterile, reflecting the occupant's scarce interest in decoration. Some framed certificates lined the walls. Seifer discovered a degree in medicine acquired at the Med School of Timber, issued to "Sybil Kadowaki".

_'She's a doctor? Why's a doctor working as a school nurse? That's kinda odd.'_

He tried to picture his own mother, Elaine Almasy, working as a nurse practitioner, and he had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from busting out laughing.

Like his mom was ever going to strap so much as a bandage on anyone who hadn't whipped up a $1000 deposit.

"Squall?"

A middle-aged lady had appeared from behind a white curtain that blocked off a separate treatment cubicle. An ancient looking stethoscope was laced around her neck, and she wore a starched white coat over brown shoes and stockings, and God only knew what else. Her deeply lined face was stern, though not necessarily unkind. She looked at Squall with an air of familiarity, and Seifer wasn't quite sure how much he liked that concept.

Nobody should be familiar with the school nurse.

"What happened, child?" the lady asked with concern, leading them to a stretcher where Squall could sit down.

Seifer immediately retreated a couple of steps, careful to make enough room for the doctor. Squall glanced at him ever so briefly as he took a seat, but he looked away as soon as Seifer had caught his gaze.

"I tripped and fell while I was running in gym class," Squall lied.

"So I see," the doctor replied calmly, examining his abrasions with curiosity. "Did you twist your ankle?"

"Yeah."

"Ah, yes... I see. Very well, dear. I'll take a look at it in a second."

She turned to screen Seifer's face and body, but the blond shook his head vehemently.

"No, no, I'm fine," the eighteen year old declared hastily as he held his hands up in the air. If there was one thing he hated, it was medical exams. "I only helped him get over here. I'm in his class."

"I see. What's your name, young man?"

"Seifer. Seifer Almasy."

"Ah, I see. Well, it was very nice of you to help him, but I think you'd better get back to class, Seifer."

"... Right," the blond agreed reluctantly.

He glanced from Squall to her and back again, looking almost disappointed. The brunette actually reciprocated his gaze this time, but his face was entirely expressionless. For a moment, Seifer wondered once more where Jeff's cruel, sexuality inspired insults had come from, and whether there was any truth to them at all. For all he knew, Squall could be into BDSM or rubber donkeys. That pretty little face of his definitely didn't reveal much more than cold-blooded indifference, let alone sexual preferences.

It was kinda ticking him off.

"Well... guess I'll see ya later then," Seifer finally shrugged, feigning indifference. "Uh... and just lemme know if there's anything else I can do."

He didn't wait for a response when he trudged out of the room and quietly closed the door behind himself. Sighing deeply, he looked at the digital display numbers of his wristwatch. It wasn't even noon of his very first day of school yet, and he already had enough on his mind to last him for the rest of the goddamn year. Of course, he just _had_ to run into a guy that fascinated the shit out of him. Honestly, Seifer had never really been fascinated with _anyone_, so this whole set-up struck him as decidedly unfair. At this point, he wasn't even quite sure whether he really liked or really hated the hard-headed, antisocial brunette, but it was most likely a good bit of both.

Either way - Squall's enticing scent clinging to his clothes did little to erase the hot brunette's image from his thoughts.

Very, very little.


	4. Hero

-:-**  
Chapter 4  
Hero**

_"I don't need a hero. I don't need anyone."_

-:-

When your mind is heavy with thoughts and overflowing with memories that are nothing short of agonizing, running quickly starts to feel like hell. You no longer run to reach a goal; you don't run to win or prove some kind of point. You run merely for the sake of running away from everything you've tried to leave behind. You start to breathe differently, move your feet differently, and before you know it, you're exhausted. Your heart will pound and your mind will spin out of your own reach as you try to deny the pains of your own past.

At least when your name is Seifer Almasy.

No other gym lesson had ever left him feeling so mentally and physically drained. His lungs were tight and aching as he sank down upon his bench in the changing rooms one hour after leaving Squall at the infirmary, and he was almost relieved that Jeff and his cronies had found no interest in continuing their argument with him. He was no longer in the mood to fight with anybody. Instead, he utilized his energy to will Squall's image into the far back of his mind, but despite his efforts, he could think of nothing else. He found himself wondering whether the brunette was alright, or whether his injury had been severe enough to justify a cast, or worse, surgery.

Dully, Seifer shook his head as he placed his shoes and gym clothes in his bag, standing barefoot in only his pants. Powerful and sharply defined muscles that had been steeled by long hours at the gym were gliding smoothly beneath tanned skin as he peeled his fresh t-shirt over his head, ruffling his carefully gelled back hair. Then, his expression suddenly darkened.

He should have acted much sooner. In fact, he should have intervened the very moment that those dim-witted dickholes had opened their foul mouths. It wasn't like he hadn't known any better, either. Perhaps he had felt like Squall had deserved a lesson for his attitude, but he had clearly missed the point at which the brunette's "lecture" had turned into something that clearly resembled torture.

He hadn't meant for this to happen.

Seifer resumed dressing himself, but shoved his varsity jacket into his bag. It was too hot to wear, and perhaps it was also time to move on - time to leave his past behind for good. His face curled and he snorted disdainfully at the notion - thus far, he didn't exactly have anywhere (or anyone) to "move on" to.

Slowly, he raised up, and his emerald eyes lost focus somewhere on the brushed metal surface of his locker door. Was _this_ the real reason for his emotional rollercoaster ride today? The fact that fate had recently decided to take a major dump on him? Really, did it even have anything to do with Squall at all? He probably wasn't half as special as Seifer thought him to be. Perhaps this had never been about anything but Seifer's ego, and the fact that Squall's rudeness was eating away at his self-confidence, which he had always deemed untouchable.

A cold frown dimmed his features, and his eyes were suddenly shadowed with the bitterness that was smoldering deep within the darker crevices of his heart.

Seifer was looking for explanations for his anger and frustration - "explanations" that were really only mediocre excuses. He hated the brunette; hated him for being the pure personification of the ill turn that Seifer's life had recently taken. Squall ignored him, he was rude, and he made it perfectly clear how unwanted his presence was in the brunette's life. Squall was everything that Seifer had wanted to leave behind when he had been banished to this town, with only one exception...

His mindnumbing beauty.

It was an incredibly cheesy thing to say, of course, especially about another guy, but that didn't change the fact that it was true. Without a question, Squall was stunningly handsome on the outside, but his inside remained a complete mystery yet. Seifer had no idea what motivated the dark haired boy's unusually distant and callous behavior. Seifer had never been any good at figuring out these kinds of things; he liked for everything to be straight forward and to the point, because he didn't have the patience for much else. He wasn't the type to go investigating someone else's life or the things that made other people tick. Honestly, he had never really cared about others all that much to begin with. And if he did bother enough to ask someone else about their life, he damn well expected to receive a proper answer.

Squall, however, didn't seem to function that way.

Perhaps the dark haired teenager's frigid behavior had a good reason; his rudeness definitely didn't seem to be reserved for Seifer alone. More so, it appeared to be a general attitude that the brunette expressed towards everyone in his environment. Squall Leonhart was, by far, the most unlikely person that Seifer could have ever devoted his attention to. Cold and untouchable - those were adjectives that Seifer had never before associated with objects of his interest, let alone sexual desire.

Then again, maybe it _was_ time for a change.

He sighed under his breath, smoothing a few stray tresses of golden hair behind his ears. Honestly, all this senseless brooding was getting him nowhere.

Overall, Seifer had come to no conclusion as he finally exited the changing rooms and proceeded down the hallway, avoiding flocks of students on their lunch period. He passed the corner that rounded off to the infirmary, hesitating in his stride as his thoughts trailed off once more. Then, he suddenly felt ridiculous. What was he doing here, anyway? If Squall honestly required his help, they would surely call for his assistance. By all means, he wasn't about to walk in there and make an idiot out of himself.

As he was standing there in his dark grey khakis, heavy boots and the white t-shirt that was tight at the curves of his well-toned shoulders, gazing down the hallway in a blank stupor, he suddenly felt someone prodding him into the side. His eyebrows knit together as he turned with a low-pitched grunt; he wasn't in the mood for silly antics.

Amethyst eyes were beaming at him fondly, and the blond immediately recognized their owner. Seifer cocked his head aside, easing his features into a less menacing expression.

"... Irvine?" he asked, his baritone voice sounding perplexed.

The cowboy skidded past him to look down the same hallway that Seifer had been fixing so attentively, but he seemed disappointed with what he found.

"Oi, what's so interesting down there?" he inquired, snickering with curiosity. "You looked so spaced out, I thought you'd spotted a hot babe."

Seifer resisted the urge to turn his eyes towards the ceiling. Was this guy capable of thinking about anything _but_ girls? Truthfully, Seifer's mind, too, had been quite occupied with the thoughts of a certain brunette someone, but at least he deemed himself a bit more selective than the flirty cowboy. Considering those girls in their math class and the attention that the auburn haired teen had devoted to them, Irvine seemed to be after anything that _breathed_.

"Hmm, shame. Guess not then," Irvine shrugged casually, before he turned to face Seifer once more. "Hey listen, Zell and I are on our way to 'Ward's' for lunch. Wanna come?"

As Irvine demonstratively jabbed his finger over his right shoulder, Seifer finally noticed the short, spiky-haired blond in the bright red skating attire roaming around somewhere behind the cowboy. It sort of looked like Zell was practicing martial arts moves, since he was found randomly punching the thin air, but honestly, Seifer wasn't quite sure what the hell the guy was doing. For all he knew, this Zell kid could be high as a kite or crazier than bat shit (or maybe a little bit of both), but in any case, his attempts at shadow boxing looked nothing short of ridiculous.

"Zell," Irvine piped up, trying to catch the small blond's attention. "Hey man, give it a rest! This is Seifer, the new guy I told you about. Seifer, this is my buddy Zell."

Zell turned on the spot, his arms still angled before his chest as he bounced on the balls of his feet. Seifer snorted audibly. Just who did this guy think he was? Bruce "The Bleach Haired Hedgehog" Lee? His hair was so damned spiky someone could have plunged him head first into the ground and used him as a flagpole.

Apparently, Zell had noticed the jeer in Seifer's dark green eyes, because his own light blue ones narrowed ever so slightly and he puffed out his chest, trying to look intimidating. Granted, he _was_ kind of cute with his boyish good looks and all, but Seifer didn't care too much for blonds. He had always found himself more physically attracted to dark haired guys and girls alike.

The only thing that Seifer could appreciate about the short blond was an intricate tribal tattoo that snaked across the greater part of Zell's left cheek and temple. It was one of those rare pieces of art that looked like their creation had caused sick amounts of pain and driven mothers to go into conniptions. Semi-consciously, Seifer made a mental note to himself to expand his own collection of tattoos. Thus far, the only ink gracing his skin was a black tribal band writhing around his right biceps, and the inside portion of it had hurt enough to last him for two lifetimes.

But, rest assured, his mother _had_ gone into conniptions, and that alone had made it all worth his while.

"Yo."

The wannabe martial artist had finally lowered his hands to officially acknowledge their presence, and Seifer noticed that he was wearing heavily padded, fingerless gloves. Seifer resisted the urge to snort once more, if only because Zell was wiping one of those hands on his skater pants and offered it to him in greeting. With a faint look of disgust snagging on his chiseled features, the taller blond accepted it, and he shook it awkwardly.

"Well, got that taken care of," Irvine announced contently, while looking from one boy to the other with a cryptic grin. "So, you wanna tag along or what, Seif?"

"... Sure," Seifer replied, while rolling one of his shoulders in a bored shrug.

It wasn't like he had anything better to do, anyway. Forty minutes of lunch until his biology class was ample time to _not_ be spending in mental awe over the orthopedically challenged ice princess. These quirky kids looked like they'd provide for some interesting distraction, and they seemed alright enough. Not the usual jock crowd he would hang with, but he had broken ties with _them_ months ago and he wasn't dumb enough to rebound.

"Sweet. Let's ride then!" the cowboy declared excitedly, ushering Seifer into a random hallway.

The blond walked with them nonchalantly, his hands buried in the pockets of his loose cargo pants. He watched Zell's playful antics and listened to the teen's recitation of his English class, somehow falling into a stupor once they had stepped out into the school court. The air was alive with a vast array of sounds, and he saw many colorful specks that were actually students who had laid out on the grass to consume their purchased or homemade lunches. Seifer's viridian eyes grazed the trees, cherry wood benches and the hoods of many cars that were glistening in the warm sunlight. Somewhere in the distance, a fountain was splashing water onto fine marble, and Seifer couldn't help but turn his head towards that serene sound.

Instinctively, he slowed in his stride as his eyes connected with a lone figure sitting by the edge of that delicately crafted spring. The scenery was enveloped by a group of beautiful old trees, which were shedding dying leaves to dance on the currents of the quiet autumn breeze. Seifer didn't have to look twice to recognize that head of tousled brown hair and the lithely limbed body propped up by the side of the fountain. The person was, of course, none other than Squall, who was sitting sideways on the marble brim that surrounded the spring, with one leg angled before him and the cool water spluttering happily behind his back. His head was bowed, and he was focused on something in his hands that Seifer could not distinguish from a distance.

The blond slowly continued walking, but he didn't tear his gaze away from Squall's image, quietly hoping that the brunette would once again sense his eyes upon him. But Squall was engrossed in whatever it was that he was doing, and his body was perfectly still.

_'What's he doing out here...? I guess he must be feeling better...'_

Seifer had to adjust his focus once they had progressed further down the street, away from the school. His mind, however, would_ not_ adjust, and he found something tugging on him and his natural curiosity, urging him to go back to that damned brunette for reasons that were still puzzling to him.

"-then she dropped it. Totally on purpose too, I swear."

"No way, man! Are you for real?"

"You bet."

"Did she bend down to pick it up? Man, I can't believe I fucking missed it!"

As Zell's and Irvine's voices phased back into his consciousness, he glanced at them sourly and his eyebrows kinked downwards. Suddenly, he had no desire whatsoever to eat lunch with them anymore, or to have lunch at _all_, for that matter. Throwing a curt look over his shoulder, he assured himself that Squall hadn't just vanished into thin air, before clearing his throat to catch the boys' attention.

"Eh... Uh, hey, sorry guys, I left my wallet in my car," Seifer lied, keeping an astoundingly straight face. "I gotta go back and grab it real quick."

They stopped in confusion, but he only grinned at them amicably. Little did they know that his wallet was stowed away in one of the pockets of his gym bag, together with the keys to his truck. It seemed like an excusable amendment of the truth, however, at least for the sake of grabbing this chance to talk to Squall.

"That's alright," Irvine offered kindly. "I got ya covered. And come to think of it, I could probably get the cute chick to give us a free meal..."

"Nah, that's okay, you guys go ahead, I'll catch up with ya at the diner," Seifer objected quickly, waving his hand in a dismissive gesture.

"But you don't even know where it's at," Zell mused, scratching his chin. "You've never been, have ya?"

"I'll find it, no worries," the taller blond bit back with a tiny snarl. "Meet ya there."

He didn't wait for their response, afraid to be running out of excuses. They watched him walking away and exchanged confused glances, but then they simply shrugged and continued on their way. Seifer surveyed them from the very corner of his eyes after he had turned around, but he didn't actually head towards the fountain until he was assured that Irvine and Zell were well out of sight.

His proud, long-legged stride slowed to a mere crawl as he approached the ethereal figure sitting motionlessly on the brim of the fountain. Water droplets were flittering through the air, glistening in the golden sunlight like miniscule jewels. Squall didn't seem to notice any of it; he was engrossed in a stack of papers in his hands, and as Seifer stepped closer, he could see the white cables of an MP3 player trailing off into Squall's ears. The brunette had changed sometime after his infirmary visit, because he was wearing his biker boots, faded blue jeans and long-sleeved black shirt, as well as his leather wristbands. His backpack was placed on the ground before him, and he held a black marker loosely in one hand.

Finally, Seifer stopped at an arm's length distance before the brunette. He looked down upon the shorter boy silently, not quite sure whether Squall was even aware of his presence. When the dark haired teen finally flicked up his gaze, however, Seifer could see no surprise mirroring in the blue grey orbits of his eyes, only mute and thinly masked annoyance.

"Why, hello... again," Seifer said awkwardly, and he raised his hand in a lazy greeting. "Guess you're out of the infirmary, huh?"

Squall regarded him with an air that suggested skepticism over the existence of a brain in Seifer's very cranium. His features were rigid, and Seifer wondered whether they were even capable of producing something like a smile. His eyes were hard like slate tinted glass, but his gaze didn't leave Seifer's face.

"As you see." Squall eventually replied flatly, before returning his attention to the notepad in his hands.

Seifer was a guy of many traits and talents, and persistence ranked very high amongst them. His brows twitched slightly at Squall's standoffish behavior, but then he dropped his gym bag to the ground and let himself flop down upon the wide marble brim of the spring, right next to the brunette.

Sucking in a sharp breath as he felt Seifer slumping down by his side, Squall forced himself to keep staring at the paper before him. He had been working on finishing his math class sketch, but with this guy suddenly at hand, he just knew that it wasn't going to happen. In his ears, Squall could hear Marilyn Manson screaming. The music was just quiet enough to where Squall had been able to understand Seifer, but the high-pitched voice of the singer suddenly irritated him. Growling under his breath, he removed the plugs from his ears and laced the cable connecting them around his neck.

Seifer, misinterpreting the gesture as an invitation to start a conversation, let his lips snap into a bright grin.

"So, how's your ankle doin' anyway?" he asked, leaning into the brunette to cast a good look at his propped up foot.

He could see the muscles shifting beneath the thin fabric of Squall's shirt as he moved closer, and the brunette practically jumped out of his skin as he quickly edged away.

"It's fine," Squall growled evasively, while still staring at his sketchpad.

The brunette tried to ignore this blatant invasion of his personal space, but it wasn't really working. He didn't want this guy to be so unnaturally close to him; it reminded him of their earlier adventure of hobbling arm-in-arm to the infirmary, and he certainly didn't like to think of _that_. The uncomfortable memory of it was weighing heavily on his mind to begin with, and the blond's overbearing presence did little to change that. Seifer looked and smelled so... intense. There was something suffocating about being in such close proximity to the blond, and Squall wasn't so sure he could handle it.

"What did the doctor have to say?" Seifer asked him, oblivious to Squall's unstable state of mind. "It looked like it was pretty swollen."

_'Why are you asking? Why do you even care? Who **asked** you to care? This is none of your damn business.'_

As Squall's jaw set and the lines of his face grew sharper, Seifer could guess those thoughts to be crossing the brunette's mind. Part of him understood this and was willing to comply with Squall's need to be left alone, but at the same time, the greater part of him was reluctant to just admit defeat. Of course, at this rate, he was never going to get anywhere. For a moment, he even considered being flirty - being obvious. Squall didn't seem to pose much of a threat. He wasn't the type of guy that would parade around spreading the lukewarm gossip of Seifer's obvious sexual preferences. Then again, Seifer knew hardly anything about the reclusive brunette, and that was never a healthy basis for a chancy flirt.

Squall didn't appear to be interested in the people around him, or anything that extended beyond the edges of his drawing pad, for that matter. He was serious to a fault, and "humor" was probably a word that he had burned out of his vocabulary with a flame thrower. Those characteristics of Squall were easy enough to figure out. Everything else, well... he'd have to get to that.

"Did you ice it at all?" Seifer asked softly as he abruptly leaned closer to Squall, nearly breathing down his neck.

"Don't touch me!" the brunette yelped as he jerked away, but he fell silent the moment he realized that Seifer had by no means attempted to touch, let alone harm him.

Seifer furrowed his brows in bewilderment, but he did not retreat. The air between them had suddenly become tense enough to be cut with a knife. They were sitting next to each other, yet neither their arms nor any other parts of their bodies were actually in any kind of physical contact. Squall seemed to realize that he had messed up, and he let out an exasperate breath. Then, his fingers tightened around his marker, almost snapping it in half.

"Yeah," the brunette finally ground out through his teeth, trying to cover up the fact that he had almost flipped over nothing at all. "I did."

The blond regarded him with a long, intense look of barely hidden interest. Squall let his head droop forward, knowing that the long, chunky strands of his dark brown hair would sway into his face and hide it from view.

"Right... so you iced it, and then what?"

Squall looked up in frustration, and even if no sound escaped his lips, his face told a story of its own.

_'Why can't you just shut the fuck up and get lost...?'_

Seifer was almost amused by the concept of being able to read any of the brunette's thoughts like one would read an open book. The boy's eyes were sparking and glowering, almost like those kinds of clouds that delivered the most vicious of thunderstorms. Squall's annoyance was painfully evident, but Seifer was too stubborn to simply acknowledge it and react accordingly.

"She bandaged it. That's it. It wasn't that goddamn exciting," Squall explained harshly, unwilling to continue this conversation any further.

_'What the hell is he even doing here? What a nosy bastard. He's acting like we're friends or some ludicrous shit like that.'_

Squall exercised some quick, almost violent strokes upon his drawing, blackening the lines of the lion that had suddenly sprouted an enormous set of wings. Seifer regarded it with curiosity, his attention momentarily diverted from Squall's foot.

"A winged lion?" the blond asked neutrally.

Surprisingly enough, Squall's head whipped up from his sketch with a crack, and he glared at the eighteen year old in anger.

"What the fuck do you care?" the dark haired boy snapped, immediately on the defensive.

Realizing that he had struck some kind of nerve, Seifer quickly put on his most innocent, harmless expression and raised his hands.

"Hey, hey, I was just asking," he said soothingly. "No need to jump down my throat, Squall."

The brunette was mildly astounded that Seifer had actually remembered his name, and his frown smoothed out, if only by a little. Sighing, he returned his gaze to his drawing, regarding it with an expression that Seifer couldn't quite place. The brunette suddenly seemed doubtful. Squall was most likely very judgmental of his own work; at least he struck Seifer as being that kind of guy. Someone who was very critical with himself, and very unforgiving.

For a brief minute, Seifer almost felt like he knew the strange brunette better than he should have.

"I really like it," Seifer stated in a pacifying tone of voice. "You've got mad skills, ya know."

_'Like you know jack shit about art. What the hell do you want, anyway? Don't you have some ditzy girls or brain dead jock friends to hang out with? Quit trying to pretend you're some kinda nice guy... you can't fool me. I know your kind. Asshole.'_

Seifer sighed inwardly. Judging by the emotions journeying through his dark eyes like the tides, Squall was obviously full of thoughts and opinions, yet he didn't seem willing to share any of them with the crowd. It made conversing sort of... difficult, to say the least. Squall definitely had a temper, though, and that certain kind of cocky, fearless attitude always managed to erect Seifer's interest.

"It hurts, doesn't it...?" the blond suddenly murmured vaguely, searching Squall's face for some kind of reaction.

The brunette blinked at that statement, and he slowly raised his head to meet Seifer's gaze, his breath freezing somewhere in his throat. The blond was smiling softly, but confusion meshed with the spunk in his eyes when they fell upon Squall's wry face. Why did the brunette suddenly look so thunderstruck?

Squall, meanwhile, felt his heartbeat stilling in fear.

_'What is he saying? Does he know what... no, wait, he can't. He **can't**. Calm down, there's simply no way that he'd have any idea of what - shit, his eyes are green. How can anyone have eyes that color? That's fucking crazy. I wouldn't even know how to draw eyes like that...'_

The brunette quickly shook his head from side to side, trying to get rid of those bothersome thoughts, and he focused on Seifer's forehead instead of his fascinating eyes. Not as appealing of a sight, but a whole lot less distracting. Seifer tried to repress a snort of laughter at the cute image; he had no idea why Squall had just shook his head like a puppy with fleas and was now glaring fiercely at his forehead, but it sure was fucking adorable.

_'Adorable, huh? Oh, fuckin' excellent. Not good Almasy, not good at all,'_ the blond lectured himself silently. _'This one's gonna be a tough nut to crack. Sure you're up for this? This isn't exactly going to be a walk in the park.'_

"... W-what did you say?" Squall finally asked, his voice low as if he was scared of drawing any kind of attention to himself.

"Um," Seifer stuttered in response, already oblivious to his own question. "Oh. Uh, I meant your ankle. Does it hurt?"

Squall's gaze wandered to his own foot, and back to Seifer's face. The brunette teen relaxed visibly, and Seifer found that concept rather odd. What did Squall _think_ that he had been talking about?

"No," Squall said demurely. "It doesn't."

"Are you gonna be able to ride your bike?" Seifer asked quickly, trying to keep the brunette from clamming up once more.

Squall, however, seemed disgruntled by the blond's continued attempts to keep up a conversation.

_'Why the hell is he asking me so many weird questions? What the fuck. Does he really have nothing better to do? I don't get it. You'd think he'd have figured out by now that I want nothing to do with him. He must be either really bored or really fucking dense.'_

"A penny for your thoughts, dude," Seifer joked, crossing his arms at the crook of this neck as he leaned backwards and smirked down at the brunette.

Inwardly, however, the blond was starting to lose faith in his efforts.

This definitely wasn't easy at all. Why on earth was Squall being so ridiculously cranky and antisocial? Was he still butt hurt over their initial, heated encounter, or what was his deal? He didn't necessarily seem like the type to hold a grudge, but then again...

"I can give you a ride home, if you want," Seifer offered generously, when Squall remained silent. "We can put your bike on the flat bed of my-"

"I'm already getting a ride," Squall severed his offer coldly, not even pretending to be thankful.

Seifer arched a golden eyebrow in mute surprise. This was somewhat unexpected. Who was giving the brunette a ride? Parent? Friend? Girlfriend? _Boyfriend_? Distant relative from 'Planet Grouch'? Something that was more akin to jealousy than he liked stirred within him and his handsome face slanted. He pried his arms from behind his neck and leaned forward, studying Squall's face with newly discovered interest.

"Oh, really? And who's taking you?" he asked, his voice holding a challenging edge.

Squall eyed him sourly, and it was obvious that he had grown completely tired of the conversation.

"... What the fuck do you want, anyway?" the dark haired boy finally inquired icily, dropping all initial pretense of politeness.

The question caught Seifer off-guard, and he immediately flipped into defensive mode, too. This guy knew well how to toss his switches, and he probably wasn't even aware of it.

"I was just trying to help you out, grumpy ass," he replied with a snap. "Jeez. Sorry I bothered."

"No one asked you to 'bother' in the first place," Squall shot back, the snide tint to his voice particularly wounding.

"Oh, is that so?" Seifer sneered nastily. "Funny. You looked awfully like a princess in need of her hero back there in gym class, or, how did the dude put it, in need of your 'Prince Charming.' Hey, I merely answered the call, princess."

It had been the wrong thing to say, and Seifer knew it, too. Somehow, their conversation had gone from ill to worse, and the blond regretted his derisive comment the very moment that it rolled off his tongue. He had never been any good at keeping his loud mouth in check, and he was well aware of the fact that he could be extremely hurtful without even half trying. He had definitely rubbed Squall the wrong way with his last comment, that much was for sure. Brusquely, the brunette stuffed his sketchpad, marker and MP3 player into his bag and jumped onto his feet, not minding the pain that surged through his left leg in the process.

Seifer was still sitting, wrestling up the humility to apologize without knowing what to really say, when Squall turned to him with an expression of hatred and a minute shade of hurt.

"I don't need a fucking hero," the brunette spat angrily as he slapped his bag onto his shoulder. "I don't need anyone!"

And with that, he briskly whipped around, stomping away from Seifer before the blond could have done so much as blink.

Burying his face in one hand, Seifer let out silent groan.

"Ahh, fuck... smooth move, Almasy. Way to go, man. Way to go."

He considered running after the brunette, but dismissed the idea again almost right away. If anything, Squall and his hurt pride probably needed some space right now, and cornering him now would only make things worse.

Seifer hissed as that brilliant conclusion crossed his mind.

"Great. He needs space, huh? Looks like wisdom struck you a little late there, Einstein. Goddammit."

He stared in the direction that Squall had run off to, then tilted his head into his neck to stare at the distant circle of the sun in the cerulean blue sky. The brightness caused his eyes to sting and water, and he rubbed at them lazily.

_'... What am I doing here, anyway?'_

Seifer heaved a deep, guttural sigh and tore his gaze away from the sun. He wasn't one for punishing himself or anything, he never had been, but for just one brief, intense moment, he wanted to run his head face-first into the next best concrete wall.

* * *

**- Much thanks to Virulent Enmity for her wonderful Betareading! -**

Yes, I finally managed to talk someone into doing this dirty job :D Bwahahahaha! Ah, but she does it so nicely. Thanks a lot hun! Here I was thinking Zell had green eyes ;) They just didn't show him enough in the game... he's so cute, really. What a shame.

Anyway, once again I don't have a whole lot to say about this chapter. I've been busy and just barely managed to churn this out. I'm kinda working on "The Devil's Own" as well, for those that have been wondering, but I'll probably post a few more WS chapters before I'll update TDO.


	5. Someone To Hate

-:-  
**Chapter 5**  
**Someone to Hate**

_"Why can't you just drop dead, dumbass?"_

-:-

"Seif! Yo, Seif! Heeey! Wait up, man!"

Seifer turned reluctantly when his own name was hollered loudly across the school parking lot on a chilly Wednesday morning. He recognized the smooth tenor of that voice calling out to him, and inwardly, Seifer cursed himself. He had never tried to meet up with Irvine and Zell at "Ward's Diner" the day before, too upset over his irritating encounter with Squall Leonhart. Basically, he had spent his last two Tuesday classes (Biology and English) sulking like the child that he could be, mentally beating himself for not being able to keep his big mouth shut. Everything after that was history - a trip to the grocery store, a three hour retail therapy session at the mall to buy pants and shirts that he totally didn't need, and some embarrassing contemplation of whether or not he should stop by "Ward's" to see if Squall was at work. In the end, however, his pride had triumphed over his humility, and he had decided to stay home.

He watched how Irvine approached him languidly, amethyst eyes sparking with natural charm beneath the familiar wide-brimmed cowboy hat. The auburn haired teen had his hands submerged in the pockets of his tight Levi's, and the corners of his mouth were twitching in a feral-like manner. Seifer thought that he could see a hint of reproach washing across the other guy's face, but perhaps he was just making this up. In any case, he thought it safer to switch on his most winning smirk and greet Irvine with a casual lift of his hand.

"'Sup Irv?"

The dark haired teen stopped shortly before him, his lips now steadily curving upwards and revealing rows of perfect white teeth. The eye-blighting brightness of that smile caught Seifer slightly off his guard, and as he began to wonder what the heck it was that Irvine was grinning about, he could feel his own smirk fading.

"Soo..." Irvine started, his voice laced with curiosity. "What's her name?"

Seifer stared back at him, dumbstruck by the question.

_Her name?_ Who was "her"?

"Uhh..." he scratched the back of his head, feeling a few hard tresses of hair that he had gelled a little too lovingly. "What the hell are you talkin' about?"

Irvine tilted his head back, though the gesture was unnecessary in itself as he was insignificantly shorter than Seifer. The cowboy stood an even six foot, and his hat added another few inches. He flicked the brim of it up with his index finger, clearing his sight.

"I'm talking about the girl you ditched us for at lunch yesterday," he explained patiently. "What's her name?"

Finally, Seifer understood, and he almost gave a low chuckle at the concept. Of course, Irvine would naturally assume that a cute girl had been the reason for Seifer's abrupt departure. Well, granted the "cute" part of that assumption wasn't too far off, but Squall's gender was at the other end of the spectrum, or so Seifer presumed, anyway. Not that he had had a chance to reassure himself just yet.

Overall, Seifer believed that he owed nobody an explanation for any of his actions. Nonetheless, he had already laid out a number of possible justifications for standing the two guys up, and he flipped through them rapidly in his mind.

"No 'girl' per se," he replied, winking smugly. "I did run into Edea Kramer though, and figured I'd ask her some _questions_. She kinda held me up, if you know what I mean."

"Heh," Irvine snorted respectfully. "'Questions,' huh? About math, of course?"

"Of course."

They grinned broadly at each other in mute, masculine understanding. After all, boys would always be boys, with no particular regard to their sexuality. And thus, Irvine merely nodded contently and pushed his Stetson back into his face.

They walked towards the school building side by side, and Seifer found himself longing for his warm football jacket that was at home on his bedroom floor. He was wearing a long sleeved, white t-shirt, red basketball nylon shorts and a stylish pair of running shoes - an attire that suited him well, but was slightly unforgiving in the morning cold. Of course, it didn't help his general well-being that he was also dying to pay a visit to the boy's lavatory.

"Whatcha got now?" Irvine inquired, while checking out groups of girls that were rushing for the warmth of the school.

How he loved this time of the year. The sight of short skirts and skimpy tops always managed to put a smile on his face.

"Chemistry, I think," Seifer mumbled in response.

"Humph... Quistis Trepe?"

Seifer shrugged.

"Guess so."

"She's a student teacher from college. Say, you partial to older chicks?"

"Uh... they ain't bad, I guess..." the blond replied vaguely, while screwing up his face in genuine astonishment over Irvine's ability to fawn over the female sex.

"She's a babe," Irvine explained eagerly, while rubbing his chin with his thumb as he seemed caught in pubescent reveries. "She's got that 'S&M' feel to her, if you know what I mean. Nasty thing, I tell ya, but in a good way. Totally naughty looking. She's probably got a supreme collection of whips at home!"

"Be still my beating heart," Seifer chuckled, unable to suppress a note of sarcasm.

They entered the building, slowly trudging down the main hallway with their backpacks slung low over their shoulders. Seifer yawned tiredly, and he brushed his hand over his eyes to try and rub the sleep out of them. He had seen better mornings, that much was for sure, but at least he could pride himself to say that he wasn't late on this one. He actually would have enough time to go and use the bathroom, if he ever remembered where to find one. Predictably, his pride forbid him to simply ask Irvine for directions.

"Well, I've got Health class now," Irvine declared, sounding obviously delighted. "We'll be practicing CPR from what I've heard! Hehehe..."

"... Umm, not to pop your bubble or anything, but I think you'll be practicing your mouth-to-mouth skills on rubber dummies, Irv," Seifer noted dryly.

Irvine stopped in his stride and Seifer had to turn around to glance back at him. The cowboy looked as if Seifer had just informed him that someone had run over Santa Claus with a semi-truck.

"Rubber dummies...?" the cowboy repeated in a stretched, pitiful tone of voice.

"That's how they did it at my old school, anyway. Might be different here," Seifer shrugged. "Just don't get your hopes up, Casanova."

"Well fuck me running, dammit," Irvine huffed grumpily, and he pursed his lips in a perfect, girly little pout. "Guess I flossed for nothing! Shit!"

After a long second of silence, Seifer busted out laughing at Irvine's priceless expression; that freak show cowboy was definitely good for some comic relief. Seifer honestly enjoyed the free spirited teen's company. Luckily, Seifer's amusement seemed to improve his auburn haired companion's mood. Sticking out his tongue and playfully flipping Seifer off, Irvine caught up with the blond and they continued walking.

Eventually, the cowboy stopped short at the foot of a flight of stairs.

"I gotta go up here," he explained, jabbing his thumb towards the ceiling. "See ya, man. Cross your fingers for me - I want some real mouth-to-mouth action today!"

"Will do, killer. See ya later."

Seifer briefly screened Irvine's ass in the tight jeans as the teen jogged up the stairs, whistling appreciatively to himself as he did, before he reeled around to commence his search for a lavatory. He found a hallway that looked promising, and he turned the corner to it in hopes of finding what he was looking for. Fortunately, he wasn't disappointed. A few feet further down, he could make out the entrance to the lavatories, and he approached them quickly, praising his own bladder control. Just as he went to grab the handle to the boys' restroom door, however, someone abruptly pushed it open from the inside.

The blond's arm halted in mid-air. Standing in the center of the doorframe was none other than Squall Leonhart, his already pale face drained of all color. The brunette blinked back at Seifer out of dull grey eyes, one of his forearms crossed before his mouth. It looked like he had been wiping his lips with the sleeve of his dark grey sweatshirt, and Seifer stared at the image in a drawn out blank. Semi-consciously, he noted the chafed inside of Squall's hand, from where pale skin had made painful contact with the track turf during gym class on Tuesday. Before he knew it, Seifer was frowning at the memory.

At the sight of the blond's apprehensive face, Squall dropped his arm to his side, even if that didn't make him look any healthier, either. His skin was like wax, and his hand that was holding the door ajar was shaking very subtly.

"Squall?" Seifer asked unsurely, and he took a half-step closer. "Uh, hey. You alright, man?"

Squall darted agitated looks past him, looking nervous, as if he'd somehow been caught red-handed. Instinctively, Seifer took another small step forward, now completely blocking the doorway. He towered the brunette by about five or six inches, and he could feel Squall's breath on his skin when he lowered his head. Squall's chest was moving in an erratic, shallow rhythm, and a thin layer of sweat slicked his forehead.

Seifer's eyes narrowed.

"Squall?" he repeated, concern now dominating the way he ground out the other boy's name. "What's the matter with you?"

"Nothing," the brunette pressed eventually, but his tone was anything but convincing.

Squall trained his eyes on a wall far away from Seifer, and his left hand was clenching to a fist by his side. Seifer connected his shoulder with the door that Squall was still holding open, and he could feel it echoing the brunette's tremors. His face dark with worry, Seifer curled his fingers around the edge of the door to steady it, and Squall immediately let go.

"Dude, you don't look so good," Seifer observed calmly.

"What's it to _you_?" Squall growled, but there was no bite to his voice.

He sounded downright miserable.

The shorter boy made an attempt to push past Seifer, but the blond quickly placed his hand flat-palmed against the wall, thus trapping Squall inside the doorway. He could tell that something was wrong, whether Squall would admit to it or not. The brunette looked weak and bloodless, like some ghostly form of his normal self.

Then, Squall started coughing - a wet, bubbling sound that came low from his chest and sounded disturbing. The brunette's long bangs fell into his face as he cupped his mouth with his hand, and every inch of his body was shuddering. Seifer considered touching the brunette's shoulder to offer him some kind of comfort, but Squall straightened up again almost right away.

"... Get out of the way," he commanded through clenched teeth, his eyes flashing at Seifer with a mute kind of threat.

His inflection, however, sounded almost desperate, a vague shade of plea kindling with the grated tone of his voice. Seifer studied him skeptically, before shaking his head.

"I can't. You look like you'll drop on the spot if I do," he declared firmly.

"Fuck you! I didn't ask for your opinion," the brunette hissed, the words sharp with aggravation. "Mind your own fucking business, asshole!"

"Hey, take it easy, alright? I'm just trying to help you," Seifer insisted stubbornly. "Something's wrong with you."

"_Nothing_ is wrong! Now get the fuck out of my way!"

"Don't be such a fuckin' prima donna, alright?" Seifer growled, and he brought his face closer to Squall's. "Quit pretending you're okay! I can tell you aren't. You look sick as a dog!"

The comparison, though figurative it might have been, seemed to anger Squall. A cold glint crept into the smoky colored blandness of his eyes, returning life to them at last, and he glared at Seifer for all he was worth. When that didn't elicit the desired effect, he slapped the blond's arm aside with astounding strength, teaching Seifer not to underestimate him.

Squall writhed out of the blond's confinement with the slickness of a cat, his backpack slamming into Seifer's shoulder as he pushed past him without looking back once.

"W-wait! Fuck! Hey! WAIT!" Seifer shouted, and he spun around to grab a hold of the brunette.

But Squall had already disappeared around the next corner, and the heels of his boots were squeaking a staccato on the linoleum floor as he almost fell into a sprint.

Seifer sighed irritably and shook his head. Looking grim, he gazed down the hallway that had swallowed the sound of Squall's footsteps, displeasure written all over his face. Regardless of what the brunette had said, Squall had clearly _not_ been alright. But what was Seifer to do? Squeal to Kadowaki, the school nurse? Yeah, right. That would _definitely_ earn him brownie points with the stubborn little brunette. Not.

As much as he hated to admit it, for now, all Seifer could do was hope that Squall was going to hang in there, and that he'd run into him again sometime later on during the day.

* * *

Almost two hours later, Seifer had come to the conclusion that he hated Chemistry from the very pits of his heart, and that he hated his respective Chemistry instructor even more than that. Irvine hadn't been kidding - Quistis Trepe, the student teacher, was a professional dominatrix if Seifer had ever seen one, and contrary to the cowboy, he did not consider that a good thing. Bestowed with eyes like an eagle and ears like a fox, the woman had been on his case for the entire length of the lesson.

Considering his unsettling encounter with Squall at the lavatory, Seifer's attention span had been expectedly short where periodic tables, chemical ingredients and Bunsen burners were concerned. He had almost managed to set his entire desk on fire, causing Trepe to nearly have a psychotic breakdown. At the end of the lesson, she had tasked him with enough "make up work" and reading material to last him for the rest of the year, while her cobalt blue eyes had been fixing him with the kindness of laserbeams.

Seifer grunted abjectly - as if Trepe was really interested in boosting his knowledge of Chemistry. Quite contrary, she had seemed like some prude, lonely college chick on a private mission to teach all the jocks of this world a lesson; she was obviously just some bitch with a grudge that nobody wanted anything to do with for reasons that Seifer could relate to only well enough.

Caught somewhere between loathing Trepe and worrying about Squall, Seifer was pacing around aimlessly in search for his art class. Finally, some random, nerdy looking girl pointed him into the direction of the "art wing" - not without heaving an apprecative sigh at his rearview, of course. He passed the school's auditorium, which was bigger than any the blond had ever seen before, and ultimately found himself in a long, wide hallway that was decorated with various pieces of art. Oil and watercolor paintings lined the stark white walls, and shiny little tags gave away the name and class of their respective artists.

His interest suddenly piqued, Seifer found himself searching for one name in particular, and it didn't take long before he halted in front of a huge, marvelous oil painting of... well, of what precisely was it, anyway? Seifer cocked his head aside and stared at it in wonder, his hands buried in his pockets. It was a dramatically oversized and particularly gloomy piece - consisting mostly of black, deep red and gray paint. At first, the blond couldn't see much of anything in that big, black smudge of nothingness, but finally he noted thin crimson lines that traced the outline of a lion's face, which was enveloped by shrouds of shadows.

_'A lion caught in the shadows...?'_

It was odd, but for some reason, Seifer couldn't stop staring at it. The lion's eyes were fixed upon him - large orbs of impenetrable darkness - and they sent a chill down his spine. Shuddering, he glanced at the tag located below the picture.

_"Griever" - Oil on canvas - by Squall Leonhart, age 16, Junior Class_

Seifer frowned slightly. If Squall had been sixteen years old in his junior year, he'd be barely seventeen now. Of course, he had already kind of figured that the brunette was younger than him, so this didn't necessarily come as a surprise.

Seifer had taken art class only a scarce number of times. Frankly, he had opted for Senior Art only to avoid having to participate in choir or band class, not because he actually _enjoyed_ painting. He figured that Squall probably attended some of the advanced art courses, though he couldn't remember what classes the school really had to offer. When preparing his schedule with his counselor, he hadn't exactly paid much attention to the creative branches of Deling City High.

Finally, he managed to tear himself away from the hypnotizing painting, though not without throwing it another curt glance from over his shoulder.

_'Weird... What is it with him and lions, anyway?'_

He found the door to his art class wide open, and without any trace of inappropriate shyness, he marched right in. The room was large and bright, with desks and chairs scattered in messy circles around a still-life that was located in the center of the table rounds. Shelves with paper and painting supplies lined the walls, some kid was rinsing his brushes in the sink, and in a far away corner, a radio was broadcasting the local rock station. If anything, Seifer liked art classes for their relaxed atmosphere.

As usual, he assessed the overall situation quickly and let his eyes browse all the empty seats. Most of the students were already present, only waiting for their teacher to commence the lesson. Some of them were reading, sketching, chattering or giving Seifer a curious look-over, but only one of them managed to claim all of Seifer's attention in the matter of a single heartbeat.

Off in the distance, at the opposite end of the room, dark grey eyes surging with waves of blue were fixing him from behind long, choppy strands of chocolate brown hair. They didn't look so dull anymore, nor did the beautiful face framing them seem quite so pale. Squall was sitting alone at a desk that was meant for two, his art supplies spread out neatly before him, and he was yet again listening to something blaring from his trusty MP3 player as he heeded Seifer with a narrow glare.

Being the bold, upfront guy that he was, Seifer immediately slapped on a bright smirk that was directed towards Squall alone and pushed past groups of empty desks, heading for that particular free spot right next to the brunette. Squall hastily turned his face to the side, probably hoping that Seifer would lose interest if he looked away just long enough.

Of course, Seifer wasn't so easily deterred from something he wanted. The blond kept advancing towards Squall's table, and ultimately dropped into the chair that was right next to the brunette's. Carelessly, Seifer tossed his bag somewhere off to the side and immediately turned to face Squall with a cocky smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

"... Yo."

If Squall had heard his greeting, he sure did a hell of a job ignoring it. The brunette was staring upon an empty sketchpad and a set of worn graphite pencils in front of him, carefully ensuring to keep his arms and legs as far from Seifer's as he could. The cables of his earphones were coiling on his sweater and his table, and he traced their length back and forth with his gaze as if they were the most mesmerizing things in the world.

Next to him, Seifer heaved a mock sigh and started to tap his fingers on the surface of their desk.

"Look. I know you can hear me," he informed his classmate with a drawl.

He arched an eyebrow, however, when Squall wordlessly pulled his MP3 player out of his pocket and demonstratively cranked up the volume slider. Seifer could feel the muscles in his face twitching, but he remained calm.

"Funny fucker, aren't you?" he teased dryly.

Seifer looked at the small, silver colored music player and back at Squall, who was still persistently ignoring his presence. Did the brunette really think that he was just going to give up like that? It took more than an obstinate little pretty boy and a credit card sized piece of technology to force an Almasy to admit defeat.

A _lot_ more.

Humming innocently, Seifer suddenly let his hand flash forward, and he snatched one of Squall's earplugs with the disconcerting quickness of a poisonous snake. The brunette spun with a stifled, outraged gasp, his face contorted as he glared at Seifer in anger. The older boy merely grinned.

"What are ya listening to?" Seifer lilted, swinging the cable provocatively in front of Squall's face.

"... Give that back." Squall growled, a thinly veiled threat grating over the words.

Seifer chuckled in amusement.

"Make me."

He smirked and wriggled the plug into his own ear. He could feel Squall giving the cable a sharp tug, but he was holding on to it firmly. The brunette, in return, looked like he wanted to stab him straight in the face with one of his pencils. His eyes were willing Seifer into the deepest pits of hell, radiating contempt. It was an interesting change from his typically flat affect, and Seifer figured that as long as he didn't overdo it, pissing Squall off wasn't such an entirely bad concept. Anger was a reaction that he found much easier to deal with than ignorance, anyway.

The eighteen year old continued to smile widely at his grumpy opposite, but once he heard the music flaring up with the beat of a thunderstorm and a rain of fast guitars, he begun to focus on the lyrics that were sung by a man whose voice wasn't unfamiliar to him.

...

_Just someone to hold_

_And someone to hate_

_And something to blame for all the pain_

_I could ignore her, I could complain_

_I never wanted anything._

_..._

Seifer blinked at Squall, who was still trying to reduce him to cinders with his burning, hateful gaze. The blond prodded him in the side, cackling amicably.

"Jeez, dude, lighten up already."

Squall sat stiff like a board with his arms crossed tightly before his chest, while Seifer re-adjusted his focus back to the song they were listening to. He recognized it, though he had never paid it much mind. He really didn't care too much for punk and metal; he was the type of guy who generally preferred old school rock and the kinda club music that you could dance to all night long. The fact that Squall seemed to be partial to this gloomy genre of music music put everything into a whole new light, of course.

The blond chuckled to himself. He was starting to feel like a bit of a fan girl.

"'Dope'?" he finally asked quietly, turning his focus outward and back to the brunette.

Squall regarded him with a glare that had clearly been aimed to kill, and he snorted audibly. The younger boy could feel anger and spite bubbling up inside him like a mass of hot lava, and he wanted nothing more than to wipe the stupid grin off Seifer's face. Who had asked him to sit at his table in the first place? There were enough empty seats around, and the fact that Seifer had taken his earphone from him without asking for permission made Squall want to thrust a pencil up the blond's nose.

"_Dope_," he bit in response to Seifer's question, his face curling.

Seifer noticed the implied insult to Squall's tone, but he ignored it. There was just something about this song that had snared his interest, and he was eager to hear more.

...

_Just something to fill the nothing inside_

_And something to make her never cry_

_Just something to thrill me_

_And something to hide_

_And something to help her say good-bye_

_Just something to kill me_

_Something to die_

_Something to blow her head off_

_Why?_

_..._

Scratching his head, Seifer looked around to face Squall once more. The brunette was crunching a pen in his right hand and the set of his shoulders was stiff. Obviously, Squall regarded Seifer's presence as an uncalled-for invasion of his privacy, and he hated nothing more than other people butting into his business. He wanted to stand up and leave, or at least wrestle his earphone from the ornery blond, but he couldn't force himself to do either. Why, he didn't know, but it probably had a lot to do with those stupid jade green eyes being zeroed in on his face with almost hypnotic intensity.

"This is 'Jenny's Cryin', isn't it?" Seifer noted neutrally as he eventually recognized the song. "Cheerful lyrics."

"Who the fuck asked _your _opinion?" Squall spat back, and he angrily swept a few stray wisps of hair from his face with a sharp flick of his hand.

He hated the fact that Seifer forced him to share something as intimate as his personal taste in music. Of course, he could have just turned off his MP3 player altogether, but that would have been a cheap win and a foolproof way of displaying that he was honestly upset. Not a great incentive in his eyes, really.

"I don't know," Seifer said thoughtfully, and he paused as he screened Squall's face with greater intensity. "Not you, sadly."

Squall's eyes widened ever so subtly and mirrored confusion at that statement. _"Not you, sadly"?_ What was that supposed to mean? And why was that stupid fuck suddenly acting so mellow?

Seifer, however, refused to give an explanation and merely continued listening to the song.

...

_Jenny is cryin' and I don't know why_

_And her life's so insane_

_So now Jenny is hating me_

_Do you really wanna die?_

_Do you really wanna die?_

_Do you really wanna die?_

_Don't cry._

_..._

Out of the corner of his eyes, Seifer noticed how Squall had started to twist and rub his leather wristbands, which had been concealed beneath the sleeves of his sweatshirt. The blond found something odd about that gesture, though he couldn't really say what it was. He could tell that Squall was attached to this song, for what reason ever. It was dark, melancholic and bitter - adjectives that could have just as easily been found in a computation of Squall's personality.

_'What exactly is your deal, anyway...? You seem... different from everyone else. Why is that?'_

Suddenly, commotion around them caused Seifer to raise his head towards the door, and he saw a short, slender woman entering the classroom. Squall, too, noticed the source of Seifer's distraction, and he seized the opportunity to give his earphone cable a fierce tug. This time, Seifer was smart enough to comply with the brunette's mute command, and he released the plug he had been holding captive. Squall quickly dropped his MP3 player into his bag and fixed his steel blue gaze upon the woman.

Her hair was shoulder length, and it was silver; Seifer found that very unusual, because the woman seemed to be in her mid-to-late thirties. Those fine strands of hair were glistening like a veil of extravagant silk, obscuring one of her eyes from view. Her other, visible eye was of a strange, reddish brown color. Her face was pretty, though not necessarily in a very feminine way. In fact, there was something decidedly androgynous about her. She wore a simple white button down shirt and loose fitting jeans that were specked with oil paint.

"Morning."

Her voice sounded mechanic, as if she wasn't used to talking much, and only a few kids responded to her one-worded greeting. Briskly, she walked up to the center of the room, where she had arranged a still life of old tin containers, milky glass vases and wilted flowers. She tugged at some of them lovingly and gave them a final, fond look-over. Seifer scratched his head as he watched her with mild interest.

Whoever that woman was, she looked like a nut job.

"Draw."

She had pointed at the objects, and then looked at her students with a commanding eye. Seifer glanced from her to Squall, unsure of whether she was serious or even their teacher in the first place. Squall, however, pulled his sketchpad close and grasped a pencil, and without a word he began to draw.

Sighing and feeling ignored once more, Seifer retrieved his own art supplies and laid them out before himself. Meanwhile, Squall continued to pretend that Seifer didn't exist in his little part of the world, and the brunette seemed content just sketching a wretched, rusty tin pot. Irritable, Seifer took turns staring at Squall, Squall's drawing and their teacher's strange still life arrangement. Around them, the other students had resumed chattering, so the blond assumed that it was okay to talk.

"Who is she?" he asked, elbowing Squall in the side when the brunette paused in his pencil strokes for just a second too long.

The dark haired boy didn't look up from his work, but he tensed visibly at Seifer's touch. The blond almost expected another hissy fit to unfold, but Squall remained silent.

Seifer leaned over to him, hating to be treated like thin air.

"Hello? Oi, earth to Leonhart!" he growled, the words roughed up with annoyance.

Squall sighed. His shoulders slumped and he rested his forehead in his hand in a gesture of exasperation, before he started to tap his pen upon the coarse surface of his sketchpad.

"Fujin."

"... Fujin?" Seifer repeated blankly.

"Fujin Takahara," Squall replied, and he drenched his voice with cynicism. "_Our teacher, _if you even know what that is."

Inwardly, Seifer couldn't help but chuckle. This guy was a fucking smartass alright, but he found that attitude much easier to deal with than the brunette's personification of a deaf mute. Content with the younger boy's reply, Seifer studied Squall's sketch for a moment instead of starting to work on his own. He watched the brunette's smooth strokes dancing across the paper, and after a few seconds, he whistled softly.

"Fuck, you're pretty damn good at this, you know," he murmured.

Squall shifted slightly in his chair, visibly uncomfortable; apparently, he wasn't particularly fond of praise. His frown, however, became a little less harsh, though the change was fleeting and only noticeable to the keen eye.

"Why are you even in this class?" Seifer asked, determined to keep the brunette engaged. "Shouldn't you be in 'Art for the Prodigy' or something like that?"

"There's no such thing," Squall answered seriously.

The blond gave a curt snort of laughter. Squall didn't seem to know humor even it beat him upside the head.

It was actually kind of adorable.

"No shit, wisecrack. You know what I meant," the blond said, talking out of the corner of his mouth while attempting to produce a straight line for his vase sketch.

Squall continued to exercise carefully controlled strokes upon his canvas, gracing it with different shades of grey, before he finally decided to answer in a flat, subdued voice, "I take three different art classes."

"Wow, really? Three of them? Like what?"

"Senior Art, Sculpting, and Advanced Placement Art."

"Damn," Seifer breathed with another acknowledging whistle. "An aspiring Da Vinci, huh? Right on."

Squall's eyes darkened instantly, but he didn't answer. This seemed to be a touchy subject. Then again, what _wasn't_? Seifer studied the brunette's rigid profile quietly, finding it so much more enticing than Fujin's dumpster still life.

Suddenly, he remembered his and Squall's earlier encounter at the bathrooms, and he leaned a bit closer when he spoke.

"You feelin' any better, by the way?" he asked in a hushed voice, his eyes caressing the fine lines of Squall's face.

The question elicited a brief flinch from the brunette, but Squall quickly resumed drawing. Where he was willing to open his mouth to talk about art, he most definitely wasn't inclined to discuss his obvious sickness after a morning lavatory visit. Of course, he was far too intelligent to believe that Seifer would quit asking, or quit wondering for that matter.

Thus, he forced himself to perform a simple nod.

"Good," Seifer cooed, looking satisfied enough to drop the subject.

Then, the blond glanced down at the outline of Squall's legs in loose, dark blue denim jeans, and his gaze traced their muscled form with interest. Why was he supposed to draw a bunch of junk when he had _this_ sitting next to him, anyway?

_'Talk about a waste of fuckin' resources.'_

Sighing, he decided to leave Squall be and returned to the struggle at hand. Soon enough, his desk was covered in bunched up paper balls and the debris of his shrinking eraser, and his drawing looked nothing like the still life located in front of him. His vases looked like deformed hot dogs, and his tin boxes showed a strange, uncanny resemblance to porta-johns. He hadn't even _tried_ to capture the wilted leaves and petals of the flowers yet, and just looking at Squall's perfect replica in soft graphite caused his frustration to flare.

If Seifer had one sensitive spot, it was his pride.

"Fuck me," he grunted irritably, holding his picture away from himself to glare at it in disgust. "What a piece of garbage!"

He slapped his sketchpad onto the desk, whirling up the tiny orange speckles of rubber that were once his eraser. Next to him, Squall had looked up and was studying Seifer's work with a neutral expression. Seifer crossed his arms in front of his chest and leaned back in his chair, balancing it on its hind legs. He grunted, again, and his eyebrows scrunched together.

"This is hard," he griped, and he tilted his chair forward with a soft creak of metal on linoleum as he gestured in frustration. "It fuckin' looks easy when _you_ do it, but it sure as hell isn't!"

He was ready to grab his sketchpad and discard this failed project along with all the other ones, but suddenly, he found a pale hand reaching for the paper quietly, pulling it slightly off to the side. The blond froze. Squall had leaned towards him without saying a word, and Seifer stared down at his tousle-haired dark head in confusion. The brunette was suddenly close enough to where Seifer could hear the sound of his breathing and take in his exquisite scent, and inevitably his pulse went soaring.

Squall had taken one of his own pencils and begun to draw very faint circles and squares on Seifer's sketch, thickening a few lines here and there and removing a couple of other ones with the blond's eraser, or what was left of it. Seifer could do nothing but gape. Squall had laid down his own work to help him out? His viridian eyes widened fondly, and his lips phased into a small, silly smile as all of his former frustration suddenly seemed to vaporize.

This was too good to be true.

"Here," Squall murmured, and he pushed the sketch towards Seifer. "Give that a try."

Before Seifer had the chance to say or do anything, Squall had already retreated to his own side of the desk and continued to touch up his own drawing, acting like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. He obviously had no idea whatsoever that his thoughtful actions had just catapulted Seifer straight onto Cloud Nine.

"Holy shit," the blond muttered in disbelief, looking at his picture that suddenly made so much more sense, and back at the other teen. "Damn. Thanks, Squall."

"... Whatever."

Despite the brunette's cool reply and the careless shrug of his shoulders, Seifer was sure that he had seen the corners of Squall's mouth twitching in the semblance of a smile. Apparently, the frosty little ice princess wasn't as entirely mean and cold-hearted as he had initially seemed to be.

_'I might just have a chance here, after all.'_

And thus, throughout the progress of the lesson, Seifer found himself turning to Squall again and again, asking him for advice or assistance, and strangely enough there wasn't a single time that the brunette turned him down. Squall displayed extraordinary patience with his desk neighbor, while Seifer was in permanent awe over the younger teen's graceful movements, the pale, unblemished perfection of his skin, the softness of his hair and the mysterious color of his eyes.

By the end of the class, Seifer was still unable to sketch a decent looking vase, but he would have been able to paint a picture of Squall's face blindfolded.

He knew that this was bad. He had to acknowledge that he had something like a crush on this kid, and even though the brunette didn't seem quite as unapproachable as he had, Seifer was still light years from figuring out which direction Squall "swung". The blond had never encountered similar problems before; usually, girls and guys alike would come flocking to _him_, and the most he ever had to do was take his pick. Consequently, the act of pursuing someone else for a change was entirely new territory to Seifer, but he was all too willing to explore it.

_'This kid might actually be worth the extra effort. He sure is a fine piece of ass, no doubt about that. I'd love to fuckin' tap that.'_

As they both stood up from their chairs at the very end of class, packing up their stuff and getting ready to hand in their work, Seifer stemmed his hand upon the table and leaned sideways to study Squall with barely concealed interest. Eventually, the brunette turned his head to reciprocate his probing gaze, irritation reflecting from the depths of his ocean blue eyes.

"What?" Squall finally asked curtly.

"You work at "Ward's", right?" Seifer said, his face thoughtful.

Squall seemed taken aback by the fact that Seifer knew this particular detail about him, and his brows immediately furrowed. Seifer rolled his eyes and sighed under his breath.

He hated it when people switched moods faster than he could blink.

"Don't get all worked up," he teased gently. "I'm not stalking ya or nothin', so relax. Irvine mentioned it, that's all."

That, of course, wasn't _entirely _true, but Seifer figured that it was exactly what the brunette needed to hear. And indeed - Squall relaxed visibly, and he tore his drawing off his sketchpad before he nodded.

"Yeah. I work there."

Squall grabbed his leather jacket and helmet that had been sitting in the corner of the windowsill, languidly shrugging into the coat. He was fully aware of Seifer's eyes on him, but he tried to ignore the blatant look-over. This Seifer guy certainly was a strange one; he was one of the very few people who stuck around even after realizing that their attention elicited nothing but a taste of Squall's rudeness. And Squall didn't care whether he was dealing with girls or guys, either - he simply wasn't interested in petty high school friendships or relationships, and he treated the people around him accordingly.

And yet, for some reason, Seifer's presence had gradually begun to bother him less.

"See, I'm looking for a decent place to eat," Seifer explained, and Squall actually found himself listening to what the blond had to say. "It feels like all I've had since I moved here is microwave chow and fucking McDonald's."

Squall didn't respond. He knew exactly what the blond was hinting at, but he wasn't going to be tricked like that. He wasn't going to_ invite_ this guy to stop by his work place; he would have rather tapdanced barefoot on a pile of broken glass while playing the fucking clarinet.

Next to him, Seifer heaved a sigh. Trying to talk to Squall was mentally exhausting. The only subject that seemed to come easy to the brunette was art, and Seifer could tell that said topic was exhausted for the time being. His next art lesson wasn't until next week, either, and he didn't want for Squall to ignore him until then.

He followed the brunette to the teacher's desk, the subject of "Ward's" obviously discarded for the moment. He was clutching his sheet of paper in one hand as they pushed through rows of desks, trying to train his eyes away from Squall's ass in nice-fitting dark blue denim, but not entirely succeeding. The guy's stride was just screaming for attention, though there wasn't even anything particularly unusual about it.

They both stopped before Fujins' desk and quietly handed her their sketches. She didn't even look them over, but gazed at Seifer out of her one, crimson eye instead. Her face was stern, and despite himself and his over-inflated ego, the blond begun to feel slightly uneasy.

"Seifer Almasy," she finally said, her voice stringent and matter-of-factly.

He exchanged a hesitant glance with Squall, who stood supply with his weight on one leg and his face fashionably blank, before clearing his throat.

"Uh, yeah, that's me."

She actually looked at his drawing this time, then back at him.

"Good. Leave. Now."

Seifer's eyebrows slowly arched towards his hairline, and he threw another disturbed look at the brunette. Granted, it _was_ the end of the lesson and he wasn't sensitive or anything like that, but couldn't she have been a bit less blunt about kicking him out of her classroom?

"Squall," she continued resolutely. "Stay. School festival."

Seifer blinked at those words and immediately turned his focus to Squall. There was a painful edge to the brunette's movements as he nodded and folded his arms before his chest defensively. His pale ruby lips seemed to thin to a line, and his eyes flitted to the side briefly.

Apparently, this particular topic wasn't to Squall's liking, either.

"School festival?" Seifer repeated the words with curiosity. "We're having a school festival?"

Squall's hands tightened around his upper arms, and he nodded yet again.

"When?" Seifer asked.

"Next week," the brunette replied reluctantly.

"Really..." Seifer drawled curiously. "I had no idea. Cool, thanks!"

The blond noticed Fujin's eye on himself, and she looked about ready to lob one of her tin cans at his head. Grunting, Seifer turned to Squall and paid the brunette a lopsided smirk. Squall's face, however, was wiped clean of expression.

"Well, guess I'll see ya, Squall. Later."

Squall gave only the faintest of nods, before turning his back to the blond and hitching his backpack higher on his shoulder with a tension that was almost unnatural. Seifer wondered at the visible tightness of the motion for a moment, and his mood soured at the prospect of possibly spending the rest of the day without Squall, but then he proceeded to file out of the room with a group of other students.

He couldn't know that for once, Squall was dying to follow him.

* * *

Disclaimers:

"Jenny's Cryin" lyrics are (c) **Dope**. I neither own the band nor the lyrics.

I don't own McDonalds. If I did, I would be too busy spending my monies to be writing fanfiction. Sorry. I figured you deserve my honesty on this one.


	6. Harpoons And Butterflies

-:-**  
Chapter 6  
Harpoons And Butterflies**

_"You look like you've got an ego the size of the equator."_

-:-

The rest of Seifer's day had passed in a rather uneventful manner. Some sloppy canteen hot dogs, some Biology and History, and a whole lotta boredom. Needless to say, he was glad when the final bell had rung and he was able to weave his way out of the crowded school building. He had run into neither Squall nor Irvine throughout the entire afternoon, but as he came trudging into the parking lot, subconsciously keeping watch for a certain black Honda motorcycle, a familiar voice suddenly called out his name.

"Hey, man! Seifer! Hey, wait up!"

Seifer turned around with his backpack already in his hand and his hair slightly ruffled by the afternoon breeze, and his green eyes clashed with Irvine's sparkling amethyst ones. The cowboy was jogging towards him lightly, one hand flat upon the top of his hat to keep it from flying off. His lips were flashing Seifer that typical winning smile, and a certain part of the blond begun to wonder whether Irvine was truly all _that_ straight - there was just something strange and fruity about him. For the second time that day, Seifer cursed his obvious absence of a "gaydar".

"What's the matter, Irv?" he finally asked, when his opposite had stopped short before him and remained unusually quiet.

"Ah, well... I was just wondering whether you'd wanna come to 'Ward's' with me," Irvine explained casually, but Seifer didn't miss the suspicious undertone to the brunette's voice. "I'm on my way there for a late lunch and stuff..."

"... 'Stuff'?" Seifer inquired with a kink of his eyebrow.

"Yah, you know... Ehh... See, I'm still working on that girl's phone number, and I, erh, figured maybe you could talk 'ole Squall into helping me out."

Seifer's features writhed in confusion. What on earth made Irvine think that he had some sort of standing connection to Squall? Granted, they hadn't ripped out each others' jugulars that day, but Irvine obviously wouldn't know about that.

Or would he?

"You want _me_ to talk to Squall? Squall Leonhart?" the blond asked skeptically. "Uhm, no offense, but why me of all people? You seem to know him much better than I do. I just _moved_ here, remember?"

Irvine shrugged innocently, and he folded his arms at the crook of his neck.

"Actually, I heard that you and him hit it off quite well in art class today. He doesn't usually speak more than two non-consecutive words in one lesson, ya know... so considering his standards and what I've heard, he's been a real motor-mouth."

Raising a brow, Seifer asked, "Who the fuck told you that?"

"Ah, just some girl in your class that I know. Her name's Sue," the cowboy explained, waving his hand dismissively as if swatting away a fly. "Anyway, you up for it, or what?"

Quietly, Seifer weighed his options. The idea of seeing Squall again rang distinctly more enticing in his ears than the prospect of returning home to his trashed apartment. His "roommate" Shiva was well taken care of, so there really was no pressing reason for him _not_ to take part in Irvine's plan, however laughable it might have sounded.

And thus, he agreed.

They each hopped into their own cars and met up again at the very exit of the parking lot, and Seifer wasn't particularly surprised to see Irvine waving at him out of a bright red Mustang convertible. It was a chick magnet if he'd ever seen one. He gave the other youth a lazy thumbs-up through his rolled-down window, and then motioned him to go ahead and take the lead.

They didn't drive very far at all. Irvine had spoken true when he had claimed that "Ward's" was right across the street from their school; it was barely a three minute walk away. They pulled up at the side of the road right in front of the diner - a large, boxy, wood-paneled building that was painted in a creamy white color and crowned by a blue rooftop. Despite the fact that most kids were already rushing to get home, there was still a fair crowd of cars clustered around the parking lot of the restaurant.

Seifer leapt out of his truck and slammed the door shut, and as he cast a quick look around, he spotted a familiar black bike that was parked only a few feet ahead of them, safely off to the side of the curb. For some reason, the mellow pace of Seifer's heartbeat picked up a notch at the sight, proving his earlier assumption that he might be developing a crush on the dark haired kid only too correct.

He trained his gaze away from Squall's bike and to the building in front of him, if only to distract himself. And as the blond now took a more detailed assessment of the outside of the restaurant, his eyes widened greatly in bewilderment.

The huge, stylized form of a harpoon graced the diner's blue roof, and that harpoon just happened to take up about half of the building's length. It was painted black and carved out of sturdy wood; if it hadn't been, its weight probably would have managed to crush the entire complex. Seifer stared at it in childish awe and it took him a moment to notice the blue neon lights flashing across the entrance that spelled out the words "Ward's Diner".

"This is it," a voice next to him declared unnecessarily.

Seifer turned and blinked at Irvine, then back at the harpoon. With his lips curling, he jabbed his finger at the strange object.

"What the fuck _is_ that?"

"That's a harpoon," Irvine chuckled.

"No shit, smartass! Why is it up there? I thought this was a diner and not a fucking fishing supply store."

"Well," the cowboy drawled, "From what I've heard, Ward's actually a retired sailor. The entire diner is decked out with fishing supplies, keepsakes from the navy and other freaky shit. It's really cool though. Come on! You'll like it."

Reluctantly, Seifer hit the small remote control for his car alarm and followed Irvine up the wooden stairs to the door. The restaurant still didn't appeal to him at all; whoever had allowed this Ward fella to plant a 50-foot harpoon on top of his diner had to have been on crack. It didn't surprise him that the auburn haired cowboy was all over it, though - Irvine, too, had some strange quirks to call his own. One day he'd probably open up a saloon right in the middle of town.

They pulled one of the swinging double doors open and stepped inside, and Seifer had to narrow his eyes against the dimmer light of the establishment that was so different from the brightness outside. He could make out a large shadow in front of him, and when he had fully adjusted his focus, the shadow phased into the tall, bulky outline of a dark haired teen that was about his age, but had at least 300 pounds to his name. The short-sleeved, dark blue waiter's shirt he was wearing stretched tightly over his massive chest and shoulders, but his deeply tanned face seemed oddly naïve as he glanced at them from behind a small, wooden reception desk. He looked like one of those guys that were really soft at heart, but way too strong for their own good.

Irvine stepped up to the desk with a blissful grin seemingly stapled onto his face, and he smoothly raised a hand in greeting.

"Yo, Rai, how's it goin' today?"

The other boy reciprocated the grin and slowly begun to scratch the back of his head with one of his huge hands.

"Ah, just busy, ya know," he answered in a deep, husky voice. "Now that school started again, ya know, it always is."

"Yeah, makes sense. Good for business though, ain't it?" Irvine mused. "Hey, by the way, this is Seifer, he just transferred here from Balamb High. I thought I'd bring him by for some of your Dad's famous burgers. Seif, this is Raijin. His old man Ward owns this place."

Curiously, Raijin blinked past Irvine and laid his dark brown eyes on Seifer. The blond smirked back at him lazily.

"'Sup?" Seifer grunted.

"Hoho... hello," Rai waved. "My Dad's from Balamb too, ya know. Went to high school there, ya know."

"Cool," Seifer replied blankly, already feeling his attention seeping away.

This was great and all, but hadn't they come to talk to Squall and that strange crush of Irvine's? Talking to some giant kid who was obviously gifted with a brain the size of a pea just struck him as a plain waste of time.

"Anyway," Irvine interrupted the blond's musings, "There's only gonna be the two of us today. And by the way, is Squall working right now? I thought I saw his bike outside."

Seifer's ears perked up again immediately, feeding on the sound of Squall's name, and he zeroed his lucid green gaze in on Raijin, who was nodding sheepishly.

"Yah. He works almost every day, ya know."

"Really? That freakin' little workaholic. Just how can you stand his grumpy ass every day, huh? Ah, whatever. What about Selphie? She workin' today, too?"

"Yah. She's here, too. Her school doesn't start again for a few more weeks, ya know."

Irvine's lips curled into a cunning smile.

"Sweeeeet... just put us in their sector then, 'kay?"

"Okay," Raijin replied with an oblivious shrug of his massive shoulders. "You can sit wherever you want, ya know."

Seifer took note of the happy spark smoldering in Irvine's eyes, and he could only hope that the cowboy hadn't seen a similar expression flaring up in his face at the mentioning of Squall's name. Having a crush was a pretty embarrassing thing, really, and he'd prefer to keep it a secret for as long as possible. After all, not everyone wore their heart on their sleeve like Irvine did.

Silently, they followed Raijin's lead to their table somewhere in the back, and Seifer was staggered by the strange array of fishing rods, harpoons, stuffed fish, fish paintings and other maritime oddities that lined the pale blue walls of the diner. Chairs, benches and tables were made of roughly carved wood and covered with squishy blue cushions that actually looked very comfortable. More than anything, though, Seifer was keeping watch for Squall's lean frame, but for the life of him, he couldn't spot the brunette anywhere. The place was pretty large and jam-packed, and there were several waiters and waitresses in dark blue shirts and little black aprons scurrying back and forth.

Suddenly, Irvine elbowed him into the side rather painfully, and Seifer growled angrily at the gesture.

"That's her," the cowboy hissed excitedly, jabbing his finger somewhere to the right of them.

Seifer's eyes followed the brunette's hand, and they fell upon a tiny, dark blonde girl in a waitress uniform who was balancing a tray over-loaded with glasses and plates, her tongue stuck between her teeth in concentration. She was looking both of them over with curious, large green eyes when she felt their gazes on herself, but she did not reciprocate Irvine's silly grin.

"Heya Selphie! Wassup, pretty lady?" the cowboy shouted across the crowded room (and turned more than just one head in the process), which only resulted in the girl blushing a furious shade of pink and quickly whirling around to run off into the opposite direction.

Seifer couldn't help but snicker, and he punched Irvine's shoulder amicably.

"Smooth move, Irv. I hope you've got the wedding bands picked out already. She looked like she wanted to have your babies like, right now."

The dark haired teen let out a sound of frustration over Seifer's taunting, and he shoved his hands inside the pockets of his jeans while his lower lip jutted outwards.

"You just wait. I'm getting her phone number, and if it's the last damn thing I do," he muttered, the urgency in his voice bordering to fanaticism. "No woman can resist this charm! It's irresistible, you hear me? Irresistible!"

Still laughing, Seifer continued to follow Raijin, but he quickly fell silent when he spotted a slender, dark-haired figure a little ways ahead of them. The boy had his back turned towards them as he was wiping down a table, but even if Seifer wouldn't have remembered Squall's dark blue jeans, he'd have recognized the smooth curve of his legs, the way his toned shoulders tapered into a very slim waist and the fine strands of chocolate brown hair swaying rhythmically with the brunette's every movement from a mile afar.

Abruptly, Seifer's heart seemed to jump into his throat.

When Squall turned around, a yellow sponge in one hand and a bottle of disinfectant spray in the other, his dark brows lowered at the sight of Seifer and Irvine approaching his row of tables. Cool, flickering grey eyes scanned over the older blond's figure just briefly, their expression arcane, but then Squall snapped his head aside and strode off to resume his work at the other end of his sector, not giving Seifer even the whiff of a chance to mutter a quick greeting.

Inwardly, the blond sighed with annoyance.

_'Well... Guess we're ignoring each other again. Imagine that.'_

Raijin pointed them to the table that Squall had just wiped down, and they sank into benches across from each other. Seifer's back was turned to Squall, but he thought it safe to assume that the brunette wasn't heeding him with a single glance, anyway. There was a faint smell of apple dish soap in the air; an effigy of the same scent that clung to Squall's hair whenever he had washed it with his shampoo of choice. Subconsciously, Seifer decided to go shopping for that same brand, even if he'd probably never end up using it.

On second thought, he wanted to punch himself comatose at the mere _idea_.

_'Godammit, what the fuck is wrong with you, man? You wanna buy his shampoo just because it smells like him...? Dude, you're beyond any help.'_

Angrily, he swiped the menu that Raijin was holding out to him out of the youth's large hands, and he begun to flip through the pages carelessly.

"Squall is gonna take your orders, ya know," Raijin explained. "I gotta go back."

"'Righty, Rai, see ya later," Irvine muttered absent-mindedly, his nose already buried in the colorful menu.

Seifer glanced at him irritably, and he tapped his index finger against his temple. To the cowboy's bad luck, he posed as a perfect valve for Seifer to vent his bottled up frustration.

"Shouldn't you already know their menu by heart or something?" the blond huffed. "I thought you come here all the time."

Irvine looked up and smiled from beneath the shadow that was cast upon his face by the brim of his hat.

"Nah," he said. "Ward has owned this place for about four years now, but he changes the menu like, weekly. He's a good friend of Kiros Seagul, our gym teacher, and Ward always makes him sample his new seafood and burger creations. Eh... I just assume Kiros is the one chucking out half of them. He's a fan of the more exotic cuisine, see. Eel, tentacles and such."

Seifer's face went blank at that explanation, and he quietly shook his head.

_'This town is like a fucking circus full of freaks, I'm telling ya.'_

Then, something else occurred to him.

"So, why don't you just ask that guy for her phone number?" Seifer inquired, motioning towards the front of the restaurant.

"Huh? Which guy? Oh, Raijin? Nah, I tried. He said he couldn't do it 'cause she works for them. Confidentiality issues, blah blah blah. Pity, cause I can't exactly ask her out at work. Knowing her, she'd never say yes."

"Gotcha. I figure she isn't listen in the phone book, either?"

"Nope. Trust me, already tried that one a long time ago."

They fell quiet once more to continue studying their menus, and soon enough, Seifer had found something that seemed mildly appealing to him - Grilled Timber Burger with mushrooms and fries - and whatever the hell exactly it was, it sure sounded edible enough.

His head snapped upwards in search for Squall, and as if their stunning brunette waiter had sensed his cue, the younger teen was already walking up to their table from the opposite side of the room. Seifer watched him silently and in a (what he hoped to be) sublime manner, but deep within his chest, he could feel the strings of his heart being plucked like a guitar once more.

_'Fuck, this is no fun. Having a crush sucks fuckin' donkey balls! I don't like this at all.'_

Admittedly, Squall did look cute in his dark blue diner shirt and the simple black apron that washed casually halfway down his nicely toned thighs. From said apron the brunette produced a small notebook and a pen; not because he actually had any need for those basic accessories - his memory was what many would call impeccable - but because he felt the strange urge to have something to fidget with. Stylish brown leather bands yet again enveloped his thin wrists, but Seifer paid more attention to Squall's dark grey eyes and annoyed facial expression than to such minor details.

_'Why the fuck won't he look at me? What the hell is his problem?'_ the blond lamented to himself, feeling oddly whiny. _'He's starting to piss me off.'_

Seifer frowned as Squall halted next to them and trained his distant gaze on the blue and white checkered tablecloth. His fingers were forced tightly around the red plastic pen he was holding, and his voice was monotonous when he spoke.

"What do you want to drink?"

Unfortunately (and to Squall's great dismay), neither Irvine nor Seifer were in any rush to place their orders. Their minds were occupied with more important, ulterior motives. The cowboy leaned back and smirked hopefully up at the brunette, who finally looked back at him with an agonized expression. The young waiter could already tell that this would turn out to be a pain in the ass.

Some days, Squall Leonhart truly hated his job.

Then again, he hated his _life_, too, so what difference did it really make?

He shoved the thought aside quickly. He needed this job, more than anything, and he'd rather force himself to be semi-friendly than take any risk whatsoever of getting fired.

"Heeey, Squall. What's up, my man? How are y-"

"Spare me, Kinneas," the brunette hissed coldly before Irvine was even finished speaking. "I'm not getting you her phone number. Get it out of your fucking system."

Seifer almost had to bite down a laugh at the severed look of defeat on Irvine's smug face. The blond's features went rigid, though, when Squall twisted around to glare at _him_ instead.

"What do you want to drink?" the younger teen repeated, sounding more as if he was offering the blond a side of arsenic rather than a choice of refreshments.

Of course, Seifer was anything but pleased over the brunette's frosty behavior, and his facial expression changed accordingly.

If Squall really thought that his incessant rudeness was going to make this any easier on either one of them, he was in definite need of a reality check.

"How about a 'hi' for starters?" Seifer suggested demurely, cocking one eyebrow. "You know, 'Welcome to Ward's', something like that? That too much to ask, or what?"

At the other end of the table, Squall's eyes were radiating murder, and the pen was creaking dangerously in his hand. How he hated dealing with this arrogant prick. The stupid idiot was so fucking annoying, and no matter how hard Squall tried to ignore him, he just wouldn't get the fuck lost.

"I don't have time for this bullshit," the brunette finally snarled angrily. "Are you going to order, or not?"

The blond cast a long, lazy look around Squall's rather empty sector of the restaurant, indicating his skepticism over the brunette's lack of time, then connected his gaze with Squall's tense face once more. The brunette narrowed his eyes, and chocolate brown wisps of hair flipped into his face when he lowered his head with a snap, thrusting his notebook and pen back into the pocket of his apron.

"Hey, hey, hold on now, hold on!" Irvine piped up quickly as Squall already turned to leave. "_Jeez_, miss priss, calm down. Of course we wanna order!"

The cowboy sighed and blinked at the menu to recall his selection. Then, he shoved it across the table and in Squall's direction.

"I'll take a lemonade and the basket of breaded shrimp," he said sourly. "Please, don't poison it. Thanks."

Wordlessly, Squall took the menu and turned to Seifer, his eyes demanding a response - and a quick one at that. Meanwhile, the blond had brought one hand to his chin, and he was scratching it thoughtfully as he held Squall's mortifyingly cold gaze.

"Are you always this rude?" Seifer finally asked, his voice deliberately taunting. "Could be kinda bad for business, if you know what I mean."

Squall's eyes were now mere slits, and his tone was full of snide when he spoke.

"Depends on the customer."

"Oh, really? So what exactly did I do to deserve this kinda shitty customer service? Please, do enlighten me."

Surprisingly, the brunette seemed taken aback by that question, and his mouth moved, almost as if he was going to give some sort of reply, but then he sealed his lips together tightly and his pretty features curled.

_'Asshole.'_ He snarled to himself._ 'Whoever cares what you did or didn't do? You exist. That's bad enough. Quit trying to be all friendly and shit. I want nothing to do with you.'_

Seifer began to tap his fingers on the table complacently, pretending to hum a tune.

"I'm waiting," he declared lightly. "I don't have all day, ya know."

Squall growled furiously.

"Look, what the hell do you _want_?" he snapped back. "Why the fuck are you here? Quit wasting my time!"

Irvine cast confused glances back and forth between the two youths that were glaring at each other competitively. He began to wonder; either Sue had been high on something real good earlier, or she had been talking about a different Seifer and Squall - because these two weren't getting along _at all_. Then again, he mused, he probably should have figured as much. He had known Squall since kindergarten, and though the brunette's nature had been distinctly more cheerful back then, he had pretty much turned into a gigantic asshole the moment he had hit puberty at age thirteen or so.

Irvine sighed. At this rate, he was never going to get a hold of Selphie's phone number.

_'I'm gonna die an old, crusty maiden, all by my lonesome. I can see it already. I'm so screwed.'_

Meanwhile, in the face of Squall's hostile outburst, Seifer merely smirked nastily and leaned back in his bench to get a better look at the brunette and the fury that writhed each and every one of his pretty little features. Part of him was enticed by that anger, which he alone had provoked, and another part told him to stop before he'd cause some kind of permanent damage.

He didn't want to listen.

"I'm here to eat some fuckin' food," Seifer stated coolly. "Not more, not less. Got that, brat? So how about you do your fucking job instead of throwing little hissy fits for no reason."

Squall, suddenly realizing that he had gone just a little too far, shoved the hair out of his face blearily and pinched the back of his nose with a mute sigh.

"... What do you want to order?" he ground out in a forced, polite tone, his eyes focused on some random pattern on the wax tablecloth as he tried to hold on to his sanity.

"A Pepsi and a Timber Burger," Seifer replied with a sneer. "If that's not too much to ask, I mean."

Seifer was angry; probably no less angry than Squall was. He had been hoping for some casual conversation, damn, perhaps even a friendly smile on Squall's side for once, and instead he got _this_. He was so fucking tired of dealing with Squall's hostility. It was uncalled for, and it was unfair.

He watched silently how Squall's pale hand reached for his menu, and for a moment he felt the strange urge to stretch out his own fingers and run them across those smooth plains of ivory skin. They'd feel soft, probably, and yet so different from those of a girl. His throat tightened up at the thought, and his muscles started twitching in anticipation as he studied those lithe, agile fingers.

Squall, however, had caught Seifer's gaze and instantly yanked his hand back as if stung. Clutching the menu, he took a half-step back from the table and his breathing stilled. Confused by that jumpy gesture, Seifer flicked up his gaze and looked at him.

It was then when, for the very first time, Seifer thought that he saw something like fear flaring up in the smoky grey depths of Squall's eyes. Fear over something that Seifer did not understand.

The blond blinked, and his expression immediately lost its harshness. Puzzled, he opened his mouth to say something useless, but Squall had seized his chance and was already hurrying towards the diner's kitchen.

"What the fuck...?"

The blond begun to mumble incoherently under his breath, still taken aback by what he had seen in Squall's eyes. Seifer had never been the best at reading people, but to him, Squall had looked scared shitless, no doubt about it. Still, none of that made any sense. Why would the other youth be afraid of him? Why would he be afraid of _anyone_, for that matter? It seemed completely ridiculous.

Then, Seifer suddenly reconsidered. In the end, he really knew nothing about the brunette, and perhaps the younger teen had all reason to be scared. After all, the brunette had a few enemies at school to call his own, and apparently they were not exactly reluctant to get physical with their victim. He also remembered Squall flinching at his touch in gym class, recalled his outburst at the school's spring the day before, and his incredibly strange behavior at the lavatory. Something about this just wasn't right, and although he ignored the reason why he cared, he knew very well that he did.

There was more to this secretive guy than initially met the eye.

"Well, isn't _he_ in a chipper mood today," the cowboy in front of him grimaced. "Man, so much for _that _idea. And I was really hoping that he'd-"

Irvine broke off abruptly, and one second later, Seifer understood why. He suddenly felt someone's hands on his right arm, encircling it vigorously and giving it a fierce tug. Perplexed, Seifer turned his head to the side and looked up.

It was the girl, Selphie, or whatever her name was - the one that Irvine was so fond of. She was standing next to him, slightly bent over, and her little hands were clasped around his biceps like vices. Her face was stern and focused onto his, and there was something feral and manic in her deep green eyes that caught Seifer's immediate and undivided attention.

What the fuck did that weird chick want?

Across from him, Irvine's jaw had dropped low enough to hit the table surface. The cowboy weakly raised a hand as if to snare the girl's attention, his face still blank like a sheet of paper, but Selphie clearly had her sights set on Seifer.

"Erh, Se-Selph?" Irvine stuttered helplessly. "Hello?"

Her head snapped up and she glared at him, wordlessly sticking out her tongue. Then, she re-adjusted her focus to Seifer once more, and her pretty features twisted with the labor of trying to wrench the brawny blond out of his seat.

"Hey, what the fuck... what do you want? Are you crazy? Let go!" Seifer barked, and he swiped his arm out of her grasp effortlessly.

She frowned at him, fastening her hands around her hips.

"You! Come with me!" she finally commanded with a hiss, and to his surprise, her voice was leaving very little room for argument.

"Bu-but-"

"Oh, _shut up_, Irvine!" Selphie snapped, and she rolled her eyes in exasperation. "I need to talk to your _friend_ here."

Seifer's eyebrows shifted, and he heeded her with a dangerous sneer. Just who the fuck did she think she was to come barging in like this, demanding his attention?

"Is that so? And just why would I be interested in talking to _you_?" he hissed back coldly, sizing her up with an arrogant expression.

Once more, she glared at him, and her little nose crinkled with a faint look of disgust.

"Oh, you _are_ interested, take my word for it! Now come _on_!"

She stomped off towards the lavatories, and Seifer reluctantly stood up to follow her, if only because her last statement had piqued his interest. He didn't have any idea what she wanted, much less why she was so aggravated, but maybe her reasons would intrigue him.

It was worth a minute of his time, anyhow.

He stopped short behind her in a separate, secluded hallway that led indeed to the diner's restrooms, and she finally faced him with an expression that prophesized eternal doom and destruction. Honestly, an angry chick worried Seifer more than an angry dude on any given day, and she looked like an angry chick if he'd ever seen one.

"_So!_" she bit insinuatingly, while giving him a challenging stare.

"'So' _what_?" he growled back, imitating her tone mockingly.

Once more, she placed her hands on her hips and did her best to try and stare him down - which proved to be a futile attempt since she was about a foot shorter than he was. To her defense, though, Seifer had to admit that said disadvantage didn't quench her efforts the least bit.

"What do you want from Squall?" the petite girl finally asked, effectively clueing him in on her motives.

So that's what this was about - she had some sort of interest in Squall. Honestly, Seifer wasn't all that surprised. He should have figured that he was butting into someone else's territory. Although on second thought, Squall hadn't precisely struck him as the kind of guy who kept fan girls or stalkers, or even a girlfriend, for that matter.

Well, he'd figure out soon enough which category to sort her into.

"Uh... the fuck are you talkin' about?" he asked, pretending to know of nothing.

"Oh please, I'm not Irvine, you know," Selphie declared with a dismissive wave, and her curled-up hair was bouncing lightly in an echo of the motion. "I'm not that oblivious."

"Not sure what you're getting at," he bit tightly.

"I watched you guys talking."

He shrugged, his face deliberately cold and arrogant. Inwardly, however, he was starting to feel at least slightly on edge. Hell, if she had really recognized his interest...

"And?" he deadpanned, still trying to sound bored.

"Aaaaand I can tell that you have a crush on him!" she declared bluntly.

Seifer's face twisted immediately at that comment, and his eyes narrowed. Every muscle in his body tensed in revolt at being confronted with her supposed knowledge of his crush so openly, and he snarled at her with thinly veiled hostility.

"Watch what you say," he hissed dangerously, gritting his teeth.

She snorted coolly.

"Look, I don't _care_ if you're gay, okay?" she sighed, rolling her eyes. "But if you don't want people to find out, you might wanna try and be a little less obvious about it."

"You little-"

"Oh, save your threats for someone who cares! I'm not scared of you," she shrugged her tiny shoulders, before her eyes lit up with fierce determination. "But you had better be scared of me!"

Now that one was comment he hadn't expected, or much less been prepared for.

Just who the _fuck_ did that psychotic broad think she was?

"Are you mental?" he scoffed. "Did you hit your fuckin' head or something?"

"Shut up," she ordered coldly. "Squall is my friend, and he's had it really rough, you know! He doesn't need some cocky jerk like you in his life. I want you to leave him alone! Understand?"

"And just who are _you_ to make a statement like that? His fuckin' mother? Don't be so full of yourself."

"Hah! You're one to talk!" the little blonde snorted. "You look like you've got an ego the size of the equator!"

They glared at each other, anger and irritation clashing in a disturbing duel of emerald orbs, but then the words Selphie had thrown at him finally sank in, and Seifer relaxed visibly as his brain finally latched into the discussion.

Something she had said had definitely elicited his attention.

"What do you mean, 'he's had it rough'?" he asked slowly, slanting his head sideways. "Rough how?"

At the sound of his harsh voice softening, she finally seemed to calm down as well. Her green eyes searched his, and she crossed her arms before her chest.

"Well... not that it's any of your business or anything, but he's got a lot of problems with some of the guys at school, you know... and he works _soo much_ to pay for his motorcycle and all of his other stuff. I know he's kinda... erh, moody sometimes, but he's actually a really sweet guy once you get to know him! He can be so kind."

"... Do _you_ have a crush on him or somethin'?" Seifer inquired with a kink of his eyebrow.

Selphie's face flushed crimson at his words and she shook her head vehemently from side to side, causing her heavily hair sprayed tresses to slice the air like whiplashes.

"No, you jerk! I don't!"

"... Okay, just a thought. Then why the fuck are you telling me all of this again?"

"Because you look like the type who gets a kick out of hurting others."

He paused at that remark, and he had to admit that it stung more than he ever would have expected it to. Perhaps because there was a great grain of truth hidden in those few, challenging words. Indeed, she had a valid point - he _had_ been one of the ignorant jocks and bullies at his old high school, but those days belonged to the past and he liked to believe that he had changed - at least by a little. Sure, he still talked out of his ass every now and then, but he usually hated himself for it afterwards. Olds habits simply died hard. Generally speaking, he didn't even mean anything by his rudeness.

"You're wrong," he finally said, the tone of his voice coarse and a bit tighter than usual.

"Oh, am I?" she chirped. "I'm not so sure. You look the part."

"Oh, and judging someone simply by their looks is all that admirable, I take it?"

The blush returned to her face, and she seemed at least slightly flustered by his surprisingly clever words.

"Well... no..." she huffed, "But my first impressions are usually correct!"

He studied her face for a long time, and she stared right back at him, defiance mirroring from the clear emerald surface of her eyes. Seifer tried to be mad at her, but for some reason, he couldn't manage. There was a certain type of sincerity about the way she had approached him, and she obviously cared quite a bit about Squall's well-being. Maybe she was the missing link he had been searching for - someone who was close to Squall and knew what the hell was going on with the guy.

"Alright then..." he said, choosing his words very carefully. "What if I told you that you were wrong about me being a douchebag, but right about the other thing?"

"The other thing? What do you mean?" she asked curiously.

He groaned. Should he really say this? After all, she _was_ just some random stranger, and a seemingly crackheaded one at that. For some reason, though, he trusted her, if only because she seemed genuinely nice and worried about Squall, and he himself was just so ridiculously interested in the grouchy brunette. Sadly, he was willing to do just about anything to find out more about Squall.

"I mean... if you were right about me being interested in him?" he pushed himself to say. "What then?"

"Then I'd tell you to stay away from him," she growled testily. "I mean it, dude! Leave him alone!"

"For Christ's sake, I'm not trying to fuck him over or anything!" he snapped back in exasperation. "I just wanna get to know the guy. Good grief."

He leaned against the wall, and she watched him drawing a deep breath. Inevitably, her frown smoothed out at the sight. There was something honest and unguarded about Seifer's helplessness - something truthful about the frustration painted all over his handsome face. She was surprised that he was even talking to her, because really, she had expected for him to punch her or do something else along those lines after she had confronted him about his crush so fearlessly. Guys like him had a habit of doing things like that.

Then again, maybe he _wasn't_ the type of guy that she had originally taken him for.

"Well..." she started, shifting from one foot to the other and twirling a strand of her dark blond hair thoughtfully between her fingers.

He glanced at her from his spot at the wall, his face gloomy.

"Well, what?"

"I just don't want him to get hurt, that's all. I don't think he could handle it. He's really not doing so well these days..."

Seifer straightened up at her gingerly muttered words, his back still connected to the hard, wallpaper covered surface behind him.

Maybe she _did_ know something.

"Do you have any clue _why_ he's not doing well?"

"No," she shrugged helplessly, crushing his hopes. "He's pretty nice to me now that we've been working together for almost a year, but he never talks about himself. He's very quiet and very private. I only know that he lives with his parents and little sister at the other end of town, and that he works here because he pays for all of his stuff by himself. It's a bit... weird, you know, 'cause his Dad's a big shot lawyer, I think. His family should have a lot of money.

This was much less information than Seifer had hoped for. After all, the girl was acting like she was Squall's fucking mother. She was strangely protective over the brunette, but didn't actually seem to know jack shit about him. It was kind of frustrating.

Suddenly, something else occurred to him.

"So... is Squall gay, or what's the deal here?"

Selphie reciprocated his attentive gaze quietly, screwing up her face. She knew that she should have been prepared for that question, and for the very first time, she regretted confronting the blond in the first place. It was really none of this guy's business what Squall was or wasn't - but then again, was it really any of _her_ business, either?

"Uhm."

"Uhm, what?" Seifer asked with a hint of exasperation.

"I don't really know," she explained, thoughtfully tapping her nose with her right index finger. "As far as I know, he's never had a girlfriend. Then again, he's never had a _boyfriend_, either. People don't usually stick around him very long, because he's always so rude."

"Yeah, well, that makes sense I guess," Seifer agreed reluctantly. "Why does he always act like such a royal prick, anyway?"

"I honestly have no idea. See, on some days he'll be very quiet and hardly say a word... then on others, he'll be like, really angry and hurtful! It's kind of confusing."

She stuck out her tongue again, and Seifer finally understood why Irvine liked her. Despite her initial display of craziness, she was cute, pretty, brave, and obviously, she was also a very caring individual; all very desirable traits in a partner, indeed.

The sudden thought of Irvine stirred an uncharacteristical shadow of guilt inside him, and he cleared his throat.

"Eh... what about Irvine, by the way?"

Selphie's cheeks turned pink once more, and she dropped her gaze to the floor under incoherent mumbling.

"Say what?" Seifer inquired, unable to decipher her babbling.

"I said... What about him?" she squeaked, the tone of her voice suddenly off by a few pitches.

"Well, he talks my ear off about getting your phone number. The guy really likes you, in case you hadn't noticed."

"Humph," she huffed darkly, and her head whipped back up. "He's cute and all, and he seems sweet enough, but he needs to stop flirting with anything that has a pulse! I heard about it from Squall, and I see him doing it here in the restaurant, too. I mean, does he think I'm stupid or something? He's not getting my phone number until he grows up!"

"Alright, fair enough."

They were silent for a few moments, both gazing at the tiled floor to their feet. The situation had become somewhat awkward, and Seifer was no longer sure whether it had been such a great idea to clue the girl in on his wants concerning Squall. Then again, he had never been the type to harbor regrets - what was done was done, and he'd just have to make the best of it.

"I guess I should let you get back to Irvine," Selphie finally broke the silence. "Your food should be there by now, too..."

"Right," he affirmed with a low-pitched grunt.

"Hey, eh... listen, uhmm... err...?"

"The name's Seifer."

"Oh. Right. Well, listen, Seifer... I'm sorry for being a bit, ahem... blunt?"

He gave a rasp chuckle.

"No shit, missy."

"Yeah, well, you see, I really care about Squall! He's like a little brother to me!"

"... _Little_ brother?" he drawled skeptically.

Selphie's cute face screwed into a frown, and she stuck out her tongue once more. Seifer couldn't help but smile at the gesture.

"You know what I mean," she sighed at him. "Gosh. Well... I guess as long as you treat him nicely, I have no objections against you court-shipping him. But I'm warning you... if I find out that you hurt him in any way whatsoever, I swear, I'm gonna kick your ass and light your nuts on fire, Seifer!"

He laughed loudly and good-naturedly at her threat and the way she was shaking her little fist at him, and he even ruffled her hair in a clumsy display of affection. It was somehow relieving to have her consent, even if he didn't quite know why he cared for a stranger's opinion in the first place. Had he been truly honest with himself, however, he would have realized that she was the first person to ever truly approve of him being attracted to another male, and said little fact alone was enough to raise his liking for Selphie to a whole new level.

"Gee, thanks, Mistress," he smirked, feigning docility. "Lemme get back to court-shipping, then, before you start whipping me or something."

"Alright," she giggled. "I'll make sure to tell Squall that you're actually kinda nice."

"Heh," Seifer grunted. "Thanks. Looks like I'll need all the help I can get."

The blond pushed himself off the wall and turned his back on her without heeding her with another glance. Languidly, he wove his way towards their table, where Irvine was already waiting anxiously. One of his hands was clutching a fork, the other a glass of lemonade, and he looked about ready to stroke out.

"Where the fuck were you!" Irvine barked impatiently. "Where is she? What were you two doing? What did she say? Does she like me?"

Seifer chuckled as he settled in his seat and screened hungrily over his burger. Across from him, his companion had started to hyperventilate noisily. Finally, Seifer flicked up his gaze and met Irvine's blood-shot eyes with a chuckle.

"Take it easy, killer," he grunted, his voice rough and low as he smiled secretively. "I think she likes ya, dude."

Irvine almost hurled his fork across the room at Seifer's nonchalant words, and his eyes lit up with pleasure. He leaned forward and into his blond friend, who warily edged back in his bench.

"Really?" Irvine cried hopefully. "You're not pulling my leg or anything, right? So, what else did she say? Is she giving me her phone number? Huh? Is she?"

In a very particular and cruelly slow manner, Seifer picked a French fry from his plate and stuck it in his mouth, chewing placidly. He knew well enough that Irvine was on the verge of blowing a major blood vessel, but after having been confronted about his own and thus far rather fruitless crush, Seifer wasn't feeling all too compassionate.

"Seifer! For fuck's sake, tell me before I croak!" the cowboy howled, wrenching one of his hands into his napkin.

Finally, Seifer's lips snapped into a sly smirk, and he smoothed back his hair with one hand.

"Relax, dude," he suggested evenly. "She said she'll give you her number... if you stop flirting with anything that breathes."

"... Oh."

Looking oddly defeated, Irvine retreated to his side of the table. He began to fumble with his hat in thought, while Seifer was already wolfing down his burger and keeping an eye out for his favorite waiter. Unfortunately, Squall was nowhere to be seen, and neither was Selphie, for that matter. Seifer wondered whether the girl had drug Squall into some dark corner for a lecture, too.

"No more flirting, she said?" Irvine piped up in front of him. "Like... none at all? Not even a little?"

"Yup. Not even a little."

The cowboy let out a strangled gasp. "... She's trying to kill me!"

"Ya think?"

"Yeah! I'm not like the ice princess, you know! I need to converse! I need to flirt! Women are the air I breathe! Just what am I gonna _do_?"

Seifer honestly had to resist the urge to drop to the floor and roll with laughter. Irvine seemed truly devastated at the prospect of having to cut back on his flirting quota, and the little wheels behind his forehead were grinding in the hopes of finding a way out of his precarious situation.

It was almost adorable.

As the blond lazily continued to stuff his face with his last bits of hamburger, contemplating the few things that Selphie had told him, his ears perked up at the sound of rubber soles squeaking on stone tiles somewhere close by. Quickly gulping down his food, he turned his head in anticipation.

Storm blue eyes clashed with his own, and their ill-tempered owner's jaw was hard, as if set into granite. The dark haired boy that had emerged out of nowhere looked so very stiff and emotionless that his resemblance to a statue was much too striking. For a second, Seifer seriously considered grabbing the stoic brunette and placing a fierce kiss on those goddamned cold lips, if only to find out once and for all whether Squall was gay or not. The moment passed, though, and Squall slapped a sheet of paper onto the table before Seifer. Doubtlessly, it was their check, and upon its delivery Squall spun around again without wasting any time in the blond's presence.

Seifer hesitated but a second.

"Hey, wait!"

Squall froze on the spot when the blond called out to him, but he still refused to turn around. Seifer stared at the brunette's motionless back, at the muscles that were shifting agitatedly beneath indigo fabric, and he didn't even notice Irvine's strange looks that were darted towards him from beneath a wide brimmed cowboy hat.

"Squall."

The urgency in Seifer's voice finally managed to break through the brunette's defenses. With his face wiped clean of expression, Squall reluctantly veered around to confront his customer again. Seifer was staring up at him almost pleadingly, and Squall furrowed his brows when he noted the rush of emotions in the blond's hypnotic, dark green eyes. Inwardly, he heaved a sigh of exasperation.

Just what _did_ that guy want?

"What?" he growled unwillingly, placing his right hand on his hip.

Seifer sucked a quick breath of air through his teeth, and he ignited the brightest of smiles upon his lips that he could possibly come up with. "Court-shipping", huh? It sounded so much less complicated in theory. Of course, Irvine's presence didn't exactly make things any easier, but most likely, it also didn't make a difference. One way or another, Squall seemed _far_ from interested in so much as a conversation with him.

Nonetheless, he had to give this a fair shot. If anything, he owed that much to his childish and all too masculine pride. Seifer had never failed at bedding anyone he'd been interested in, and he wasn't about to start now.

"I wanted to ask you a favor," Seifer started slowly, not quite yet sure where he was going with this.

Squall seemed less than appealed by the idea of doing _anyone_ any favors, but at least he didn't stomp off right away. Sure, his cold, grey eyes darkened with suspicion and he crossed his arms before his chest in a very pissy manner, but by all means, at least he was listening.

It was more attention than most had ever received from Squall Leonhart.

"We have math again tomorrow," the blond continued, his mind working on light speed, "And I, uh, kinda need some help going over the homework she gave us... Edea, I mean... uh, yeah... So I was wondering if you could, you know, help me out."

Seifer groaned silently to himself over how desperate he had to sound. This was a rather lame attempt at coaxing the brunette into spending time with him, and without a question, Squall must have seen right through his act. He could have hardly been any more obvious. Strangely enough though, the brunette merely continued glaring at him and didn't collapse with laughter at his pathetic move.

"I'm not a teacher," Squall finally deadpanned.

"No shit, smarty pants, I hadn't noticed," Seifer retorted sarcastically, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. "But I saw you in class, you're a fuckin' whiz kid. I totally suck at math, and if I flunk it I'm gonna be in some really deep shit. My Dad would kill me, literally. I'm not even joking. I'm pretty sure he's got my tomb stone picked out and everything."

Seifer hadn't placed much hope in his attempt at luring Squall into meeting up with him, but for some odd reason that last statement seemed to have elicited the dark haired boy's attention. Something in his face changed, though Seifer could by no means say what exactly it was. Squall looked infinitely softer, a bit more insecure and a lot less uncaring, but most importantly, his frown gradually eased into an almost humane expression.

"Fine," Squall responded eventually, trying hard to sound annoyed. "I'll do it tomorrow before school. Meet me at the spring."

"No kidding? Sweet, alright!" Seifer exclaimed happily, and he could almost feel his heart skipping in his chest. "I'll be there, like, a half hour before class, is that cool with ya?"

"Whatever."

Squall shrugged and turned on his heel in one fluid motion, his fine brown hair sweeping into his face as he walked away. Meanwhile, Seifer was absolutely ecstatic over the propsect of spending a whole half hour in Squall's sole presence. Frankly, the brunette had surprised him by accepting his plea for assistance, but Squall's reasons were of little importance to him at that point.

Still beaming like a lovesick schoolgirl, he spun around to face Irvine, who gave him a rather peculiar look.

"What?" Seifer muttered, shoving the last bite of hamburger into his grinning mouth.

"What was _that_ just now?" Irvine mumbled, pointing in the direction where Squall had vanished.

"Whaddaya mean?"

"You know exactly what I mean! He was like... almost _nice_. I thought he was gonna chew your head off at first, but I haven't seen him be that civil since kindergarten. And how come ya asked _him_ for help and not me?"

Seifer swallowed as he quickly tried to think of an excuse. A dozen answers, none of them really useful, whirled around inside his head.

"Well," he started, shrugging. "I just thought it'd be a good chance to probe around in the whole Selphie affair some more, you know what I mean? Squall seems to know her a lot better than you do."

_'I could go for some probing around right now, although not in the Selphie thing, if you get my drift.'_

Surprisingly, Irvine seemed entirely satisfied with that answer. Nodding proudly as he murmured "good thinking", he grasped their check, took a brief look at it and slapped a $20 bill upon the table.

"Hey, I'll get that," Seifer protested.

He always felt like a girl when someone treated him for a meal, granted that "someone" wasn't his parents. The cowboy waved at him dismissively, then took a last sip of his lemonade and got up.

"Nah, this was your first time here, dude. It's my treat."

"Alright," the blond shrugged. "Thanks, man."

"Sure, sure."

As they filed out of the restaurant and bid Raijin a quick good-bye, emerald green eyes were ever-searching for their storm grey counterpart, but once again, Squall was nowhere to be found. Seifer thought that he had seen a flash of Selphie's skirt disappearing around a corner somewhere, but he wasn't entirely sure and didn't care too much in the first place.

And as for Squall...

Well, at least he had something to look forward to.


	7. Sunrise in Hell

-:-**  
Chapter 7  
Sunrise in Hell**

_"Did someone have a piss fest in your Cheerios this morning?"_

-:-

He was early... way too early, to do the truth even any justice.

For Seifer Almasy, who usually showed up to class at least five minutes late, simply being on _time_ was a downright accomplishment. And yet there he was, 7:00am sharp, sitting at the edge of Deling City High's fountain and cursing at the coldness of the marble stone beneath his ass. It simmered through the thin fabric of his nylon shorts, and the crisp chill of the air cut into his bare arms; of course, only an idiot would wear a short sleeved shirt at such ungodly hours in the morning. Unfortunately, there'd been a few too many girls and guys telling Seifer just how nice his toned upper body looked in a snug white t-shirt, and he generally took ample advantage of said physical asset - even if it entailed the danger of catching a few nasty frost boils.

His emerald eyes screened the yet empty school courtyard. Thin layers of mist and morning dew were dusting blades of grass swaying gently in the crisp breeze, and only the spots already kissed by the slowly ascending sun were halfway bearable to Seifer. Fortunately, the spring proved to be one of said spots. Seifer's book bag was resting between his legs, providing at least marginal comfort. Seifer glowered down upon the red backpack, recalling his late night attempts at working through his math homework. He usually tried to get by without, but considering Squall's willingness to tutor him, Seifer had thought it wise to at least give off the _impression_ that he cared about his school work.

In truth, Seifer cared little about anything but partying and sports. Football, track, baseball, basketball - he excelled in any sport that he had ever bothered to take up. He figured that he would end up a pro player; after all, he definitely possessed the skills and the connections. He'd go to college after his senior year, play on the university team for a while, bed a whole fuckload of men and women, and eventually become a pro. It was as simple as that. Nothing else but fun and fame really seemed to matter.

And yet, for some reason, Seifer had wasted scarcely a thought on college or sports at all throughout the past few days. He had been supposed to talk to his football coach, and to that Kiros Seagul bloke also, come to think of it. Truth be told, he had done neither, but the prospect of possibly not being able to play anything at all that season left him surprisingly unperturbed.

Thinking of Squall, however, was an entirely different story.

At school, in his car, in his apartment, at the gym, in the park, at the grocery store, in bed - hell, even on the fucking _toilet_ - there was no place that Seifer hadn't wasted at least one thought on the silent brunette. This was a full blown crush (according to Seifer's scarce experience with crushes, anyway) and the blond wasn't entirely sure how much he fancied that idea.

Sighing, Seifer rested one elbow upon his knees and perched his face in the hollow of his palm, frowning at his own pathetic self. The "Prince of Jocks" was sitting on a fountain at fucking seven in the morning, freezing his ass off and waiting for his secret crush to give him _math lessons_ of all things... Could things possibly get any lamer than that?

_'...What if he doesn't show up?'_

Frankly, that idea too had occurred to Seifer more than just once, and he didn't like it one bit. Nobody had ever dared to stand him up, but it wasn't really his pride that he was worried about this time. He had actually been looking forward to this, and the prospect of Squall possibly not turning up made his insides churn just a little bit.

_'For fuck's sake, pull yourself together, Almasy. He'll come. ... I think. I hope...? Fuck.'_

Groaning, he dumped his face into his hand and closed his eyes. Yeah, a whole fat load of good this crush was doing him. He should have just stuck to the original plan and dated some random dumb bitch like that Rinoa girl, or whatever her name was. At least then he wouldn't have to _pretend_ that he didn't care... pretend that he _wasn't_ gay, or bisexual, or what the flying fuck ever.

Instead, he had managed to get himself into _this _royal mess.

"Trying to think, are you...? Looks painful."

Seifer's head jerked up at the unexpected and rather snide voice that had erupted from somewhere right in front of him. Blinking, his eyes scanned long, slender legs in light blue, washed out jeans and an almost too thin body wrapped in a tight leather jacket. A pair of arms was crossed fiercely before that person's chest, a black biker helmet clutched in one hand, and when Seifer elevated his gaze even further, his emerald green eyes clashed with dusty grey ones that glared back at him coldly.

"Squall," Seifer said blankly, noticing how the brunette's face snapped into a frown. "Uh. Hey."

Squall said nothing and continued to stare at him calmly, his eyes unusually dark. Finally, he circled the blond's hunched figure and dropped down upon the brim of the spring next to him. He placed his helmet between himself and Seifer, wordlessly staking his territory. Seifer arched an eyebrow at the gesture, but remained silent; obviously, if he wanted to play this game, it would have to be by Squall's rules.

The blond glanced at his wrist watch, while Squall placed his black backpack on the ground between his feet.

_7:05am._

"You're early," he stated plainly and looked at the younger boy with an expression that suggested surprise.

"I can leave again," Squall responded dryly.

"C'mon, that's not what I meant," Seifer growled in exasperation, trying to wrestle up all his patience. "Grumpy ass."

God, this was difficult.

Somehow, he could sense that something between them had changed. Squall's aura was darker and more aggressive than the day before. His voice held more chill than a whole _battalion_ of freezers. A wiser man than Seifer would have probably opted to stay the fuck away from the dark haired youth, but wisdom had never been one of the blond's acclaimed assets. Besides, he was already too intrigued by Squall to simply give in and walk away from this thing.

Suddenly, Seifer recalled Selphie's words at the diner, wondering yet again at their meaning.

_..: "On some days he'll be very quiet and hardly say a word... then on others, he'll be like, really angry and hurtful. It's kind of confusing." :.._

"Do you want to do this, or what?"

Seifer adjusted his focus to the brunette's rigid face once more, and he nodded quickly before Squall had a chance to stand up and take his leave.

Of course he wanted to fucking do this, but the other youth wasn't exactly making things any easier, either. He probably had his reasons for being so goddamn difficult, but Seifer figured that there was little point in prying for them.

The blond snarled abjectly. He hated secrets more than anything, even if he_ did_ have a few of his own.

Next to him, Squall's face had soured with impatience. Fortunately, Seifer noticed this and swiftly reached inside his bag to retrieve his notebook, holding it out for the brunette to take.

"There."

Squall swiped it out of his hands rudely and flipped it open in one smooth motion, then shoved a few strands of hair out of his eyes to clear his sight. Seifer watched him silently, marveling at the dark haired beauty's clean-cut profile. There wasn't a single mark or blemish that tainted his porcelain skin; he looked so perfect that it was damn near surreal. Again, there was that sweet smell of apples and cinnamon lingering in the moist morning air, clinging to Squall's hair and the firm leather of his jacket.

Seifer gulped.

"Thanks for coming," he muttered disjointedly, forcing himself to focus. "I, uhm, appreciate it. Really."

Squall flicked up his gaze and glanced at him from the corner of his eye, but refused to break his fashionable state of silence. He had magically produced a pencil from somewhere and was now exercising assertive strokes upon the calculations in Seifer's notebook.

The blond cringed.

"That bad, eh?"

He rubbed the back of his neck in distress, while at the same time attempting to crane it around just far enough to cast a better look at his papers in Squall's lap. Frankly, he didn't give a rat's ass about his homework, but it offered a rather convenient excuse for him to move a bit closer to his object of desire.

Squall was an intoxicating sight, really. If it wasn't for his lack of people skills, he'd probably have girls and guys flocking to him left and right, Seifer decided. On the other hand, he was quite glad that hardly anyone acknowledged Squall's attractiveness. It seemed to make things at least a _bit_ less complicated.

Not that he had ever been one to fear competition or anything...

_'Gee, I should open up a fan club while I'm at it. Then again, I could just save myself the trouble and lob myself off the next bridge, 'cause he'd sure as hell kill me if I didn't.'_

As the minutes passed on and the younger boy continued to correct his work in silence, Seifer eventually grew bolder (or more suicidal, whichever) and unobtrusively tried to slide across the marble and closer to Squall's side.

Unfortunately, that damned helmet was right in his fucking way.

Cursing inwardly, Seifer glowered down upon the offensive object. Reducing it to shreds by mere utilization of his best death glare, however, proved futile, so he ultimately had to resort to more drastic measures.

The blond curled his fingers around the edge of the helmet and lifted it off the marble surface, wordlessly holding it out to the brunette. Squall looked up and blinked at it in confusion. Seifer's lips curved into a faint smile, a gesture that seemed to suggest "Look... I don't bite." He knew that if he'd simply put the helmet aside and move in, he would accomplish nothing. As absurd as the whole situation might have been, he understood only too well that he needed Squall's permission.

To his great and pleasant surprise, the brunette slowly reached out and took his possession from him, his eyes boring into Seifer's as their hands almost touched. The grey seemed to fade from those cold, hard orbs as they were studying Seifer's face, acknowledging the blond's respectful gesture, and there was a strange spark between the two young men that neither of them could any longer deny.

Squall placed his helmet off to his right side and lowered his gaze back to the notebook in his lap, pretending to be coolness itself. Still - he tensed visibly when he felt Seifer moving in to him, closing the space between their bodies. He was about to recoil from the prospective touch, but Seifer was considerate enough to stop short before it had even come to pass.

Obviously relieved, Squall resumed breathing and reading through Seifer's homework. He knew that the blond was watching him. Part of him hated him for this, but the other didn't mind too much - in fact, he was feeling uncharacteristically curious. When he was around Seifer, Squall felt like a little kid that was gazing at the beautiful, flickering flame of a candle - wanting to touch it even though he knew it was going to burn.

Irritably, Squall glared at the notes before him. Why was he even doing this? He couldn't remember. The soft hearted, useless idiot in him had granted Seifer's plea for assistance yesterday, but where was that idiot now? What had he been _thinking_ to agree to his, anyway?

Eventually, Squall simply decided to blame this on a case of momentary stupidity that had befallen him for what ever inscrutable reason and to move on with it, if only to get this over with as quickly as possible.

"Were you even_ looking_ at the paper when you did this?" he grunted and jabbed his pen at the homework that was littered with errors.

Next to him, Seifer gave a lopsided smirk.

"Occasionally," he lilted.

"Figures."

"That bad? Seriously?" Seifer asked, drawing up his eyebrows.

"... Worse."

"Gee, you're awfully encouraging," the blond huffed, feigning frustration. "'Scuse me while I go lob myself off the nearest bridge!"

Seifer hadn't expected the brunette to turn around and stare at him with a struck expression. His eyes were wide like those of a child, flaring white around the rim, and there was something weird in those storm blue depths that Seifer couldn't possibly understand, much less explain. The brunette's disturbed looking face almost frightened him.

What the hell? Had Squall actually taken his joke seriously?

"Hey, hey, I was jokin'," he quickly tried to reassure him. "Don't look at me like that."

Squall continued to stare at him some more, then reeled his head aside. His jaw was awfully tight, and judging by the way his jugular was jerking, Seifer could tell that he was swallowing hard.

"I know you were joking," the brunette bit eventually, his tone flat.

"Then why-"

"Just shut up, alright?"

There was no bite to Squall's voice, only a faint drizzle of annoyance as he tried to force his focus back upon the sloppy handwriting on the papers before him. Seifer studied him quietly for a minute, before deciding to let the subject go.

It was the smartest thing he had done in a while.

"By the way," Seifer started slowly, watching closely for Squall's reaction. "This is the second time you're helping me."

The brunette kept staring at the notebook and Seifer could see how his eyebrows mashed together.

"Your point?" the dark haired boy bit.

"My point?" Seifer repeated. "Uh. I guess I just wanted to thank you. That okay with you, or what, your highness?"

Squall crossed a few numbers out on the paper, using a whole lot more force than was necessary.

"Whatever."

"You're a funny fucker, you know that?" Seifer purred, caressing Squall's profile with his eyes. "Hey, by the way, how old are you, anyway?"

"... Seventeen."

"Ah, yeah. That's what I thought. Guess I'm just that good."

The brunette looked up at him, grimacing questioningly.

Seifer was "just that good"? What the hell was that supposed to mean exactly? Good at _what?_

_'Stupid prick.'_

Seifer snorted at the brunette's irritated expression, elbowing Squall in the side playfully.

"Man, my balls for a fucking mirror," he laughed, pointing at Squall's face. "I swear, you should see yourself right now."

The brunette's high cheek bones acquired a rather lovely shade of pink when the older boy was taunting him, and he whipped his head around once more, trying to hide his blush.

"Whatever," he growled.

Seifer smiled. "You sure say that a lot."

"And you're annoying."

"Yeah, I know."

Squall merely shook his head, but said nothing. Secretly, he kind of enjoyed talking to the ornery blond. Their conversations seemed so effortless. They would simply throw pointless remarks and insults at each other, dishing out and receiving like it was just some sort of game. It was... fun, for a lack of a better term, and it provided for some well needed distraction.

Carefully, Squall threw a half-glance up at Seifer, who was now gazing out into the school yard. The sun had finally broken through the tight web of clouds completely, and the warm, bright rays bounced off the blond's hair and skin in a fascinating play of light. Seifer's hair was glistening like pure, finely spun gold, and his skin could have rivaled any expensive bronze statue's complexion. He looked great in that simple white t-shirt he was wearing, and considering the chilly temperatures of a Deling City morning, he was probably fully aware of it, too. Then again, maybe he was just really stupid - an option that Squall hadn't entirely ruled out yet.

Either way - Seifer was hot and a downright jock if Squall had ever seen one.

Involuntarily, the brunette's eyebrows laced together at that thought. Why was Seifer so eager to hang out with him, anyway? He had asked himself that question more than just once over the last few days, but had never come up with a satisfying answer. The blond wasn't his kind of crowd at all; hell, Squall didn't even _have_ a "crowd". Few people ever bothered to talk to him anyway, and if they did, they disappeared again pretty quickly. Nobody wanted to hang around a cold hearted, antisocial asshole.

Again, Squall's gaze drifted towards Seifer and his frown gradually smoothed out.

"Nobody"...?

Emerald eyes suddenly zoomed in on his face, and Squall started at the attentiveness in Seifer's gaze. Muttering something incoherent, he quickly dropped his head back down to glower at the blond's homework and pretend that he hadn't been staring.

Seifer had noticed the strange look in Squall's eyes, and it had elicited his curiosity. The brunette seemed oddly docile all of a sudden - friendly almost. At least he didn't look like he was going to rip the next best person's head off, which was an achievement all in itself.

The blond couldn't help but smile at that thought.

"So," he finally said, his voice deliberately light. "What do you do on the weekends, anyway?"

It was a harmless question, but Squall scowled at him all the same. Not that Seifer had expected anything else, really. He grinned and fumbled with the fabric of his shorts, smoothing them over the strong muscles that glided beneath the tanned skin of his thighs. He knew that Squall was watching him.

"Why are you asking?" the brunette huffed coolly, trying to ignore the hypnotic glow in Seifer's eyes.

_'So... green...'_ Squall thought as he felt himself drowning in that emerald stare, but he shook the notion out of his mind immediately.

He couldn't do this.

"Oh... no reason. I was just curious," Seifer replied innocently.

"... I work."

Seifer cocked an eyebrow at that piece of information, but Squall refused to meet his curious gaze again.

"You work _all_ weekend?" the blond asked.

"Yeah."

"Why?"

Squall screwed up his face in disapproval, irritably tapping his pen upon the surface of Seifer's notebook. If there was one thing he didn't like, it was being asked dumb, nosy questions. Talking to Seifer was alright, as long as it didn't involve some kind of emotional striptease. Squall's private life was just that - private.

"You ask too many questions," he stated dryly.

"So? You don't give enough answers."

The brunette snorted at that retaliation, and he flicked some strands of chocolate brown hair out of his face to let Seifer suffer the full extent of his death glare. Unfortunately, the blond didn't seem all too impressed.

Finally, Squall sighed in defeat.

"That's 'cause it's none of your business," he replied stoically.

"I'm just trying to make conversation."

"Do something else, then."

Seifer pondered that remark for a moment, watching with interest how Squall once more pretended to be all concentrated on his work. For some reason, the blond eighteen year old was starting to feel rather bold. After all, Squall hadn't killed him yet, and he was actually _talking_.

This situation had potential.

_'Something else, huh?'_ He thought to himself, grinning. _'Alright, something else you shall get then, my frosty lil friend.'_

Sneering good-naturedly, he leveled his gaze with Squall's face.

"Well then. Want me to give you a bath in the fountain instead?" he offered with a daring smirk.

The brunette growled in reply.

"No," he snapped, frowning at the teasing bite in Seifer's voice.

"Come on," Seifer chuckled suggestively, suddenly grabbing a hold of the brunette's arm and edging him towards the water. "It'd be fun."

"Fun my ass," the younger boy barked irritably, which caused Seifer to laugh even harder and tug at his arm some more. "Knock it off!"

But the hysteric shade to Squall's voice only drove Seifer to ascend new levels of feistiness.

"Squally-boy's gonna get wet..."

"Seifer..." the brunette hissed softly, now shadowing the name with a subtle threat. "Cut it out."

"Oh yea, wet, wet, wet," Seifer chanted playfully, shoving and pulling at Squall's limbs.

Without issuing another warning, Squall creamed the lively blond over the head with his notebook, though he was considerate enough not to place too much force behind the blow. Nonetheless, Seifer let out a strangled yelp. He was swearing at the brunette from under his breath, groaning and rubbing his aching forehead, but he didn't stop laughing.

"Alright, you're getting that back," he threatened mischievously, his hand still curled around Squall's biceps. "You're taking a bath now, Leonhart!"

"Don't you fucking dare-"

"Oh, but I do!"

"I'm gonna-"

"... Seifer?"

Both Seifer and Squall winced at the painfully high pitch to the female voice that had called out the blond's name from somewhere to their left. Seifer turned around slowly, groaning inwardly as his eyes fell upon the slim, pink-clad figure of a certain brunette classmate who was squired by two of her friends - one of them being Michelle, the curly haired blonde girl that Irvine had talked to during math class.

Reluctantly, Seifer let go off Squall's arm.

Rinoa was looking down at the two guys reproachfully, her dark brown eyes framed by thick lashes that had received a rather thorough treatment with jet black mascara. Her fingers raked through her long, silken hair thoughtfully, before she let herself flop down upon the edge of the spring, right next to Seifer.

About a split second later, she jumped a good foot's worth into the air.

"Eek! Oh my _gosh_, this thing is freezing! How can you sit here?" she whimpered at the chill beneath her tender butt, and her friends immediately joined into her lament as they sunk down beside her.

Seifer could have sworn that he saw Squall rolling his eyes.

"Uh, yeah... It's a bitch, ain't it?" the blond commented, trying to withstand Rinoa's look-over without letting his annoyance shine through. "Well, what's up, ladies?"

The brunette girl smiled suggestively, the oh so terrible cold apparently already forgotten.

Seifer couldn't help but grin on the inside.

_'Yep, this body works magic. I bet I could wake up the dead if I really tried.'_

"Just seeing what you're up to," Rinoa explained and crossed her legs, not without butting her knee into Seifer's. "Hey, you're still coming with us on Friday, right?"

Seifer paid her a weak half-smirk as he remembered. He had almost forgotten about their rendezvous on Friday night, or repressed the memory of it, more like it. At his side, Squall had become awfully quiet and motionless; he had even stopped to violently cross out errors in Seifer's homework and was now merely staring at it in a silent stupor.

"Uh... yeah... uh... I mean..." Seifer started hesitantly, digging for excuses that wouldn't quite come to him.

"Great. Don't let Irvine and us down, 'kay?" she cooed, placing her hand on his arm and leaning into him quite obviously. "So... what are you doing here, anyway?"

Seifer resisted the urge to sever her arm at the shoulder with a blunt object, and instead continued to smile, though his face was already starting to hurt from the strain. He didn't like this chick, nor did he like her friends, but they were rather attractive female specimens, and he was a guy - he was _supposed_ to like them, and he was painfully aware of that. Then there was Irvine, of course... not that Seifer felt like he really owed the cowboy any more favors, but the auburn haired guy served as a valid excuse for his pretense of friendliness all the same.

Considering the fact that she had brought Irvine up in the first place, Seifer wondered whether Rinoa understood that, too.

"Homework," the blond eventually replied flatly. "Squall's helping me out."

"I see," she said, before glancing from Seifer's notebook to Squall with an unreadable smirk curving her glossy lips. "Oh, right. Squall. I hardly even saw you back there. How are you?"

The brunette didn't heed her with a single look nor word, but Seifer could hear how the pace of Squall's breathing picked up a notch. The dark haired male's eyebrows were twitching, and so were his fingers that were clasping the pen. Somehow, the older blond couldn't help but wonder at that sudden change in the brunette's body language. Did Squall have a crush on the girl, or why did he suddenly look so on edge? Seifer studied the dark haired youth's features intently from the side, searching it for some brilliant sort of revelation, but Squall refused to look at him, too.

_'Come on...'_ Seifer thought with a grim smile._ 'He's gotta have better taste than** that**!'_

"Well, talkative as ever, I see," Rinoa said with a careless shrug, causing her girlfriends to giggle and whisper to each other.

Squall bit down hard upon the inside of his cheeks. Him and Rinoa had practically been loathing each other ever since their freshman year, when she had asked him to a dance and he had refused. Maybe he hadn't exactly been... _polite_... back then, but that had been no justification for her to go around spreading nasty rumors that some students were all too eager to believe.

He frowned at the memory. He hadn't been called a fag in a while, perhaps because Rinoa had eventually grown tired of her little witch hunt, but he knew that "fag" was still what some students were thinking when they laid eyes on him. Frankly, Squall didn't give two hot shits and a giggle about anyone's opinion of him, but all the same, he had never forgiven Rinoa for what she had done. He wasn't gay. He wasn't straight. He wasn't _anything_, for that matter, because he hated labels of any kind, but that was none of anyone's business - least of all her's. What did _she_ know about him and his life, anyway? She knew _nothing_. Not a goddamned thing.

Suddenly, as he was slipping into his own, chaotic world of thoughts, Squall felt the notebook he'd been holding being taken from his hands without warning, but he did not object to that intrusion. Glancing over at his fellow teenagers, he could see that Rinoa was holding on to Seifer's homework now, skimming over the lines that he had marked and corrected.

The brunette's face was still blanched of emotions.

"Jeez, Squall, you made a real mess in his notes, you know," the girl said abjectly, creasing her forehead at the paper in front of her. "How's Seifer supposed to read this?"

Seifer turned to his left and curiously screened over his homework again at her chiding words. Indeed, the blond thought to himself, the paper was a bit, well, _crowded_ looking since Squall had gotten a hold of it, but that was probably to blame on the fact that he had made just about every mistake known in math history.

Squall,meanwhile, merely stared at his kneecaps, hearing Seifer mutter something along the lines of "Well, that's kinda my fault, you know," but he was already beyond the point of caring. He suddenly felt like an idiot for believing that maybe, just maybe, Seifer was different from all the other snobbish, superficial dumbasses at their school. Yeah, right - all it took was some ditzy bitch in a low cut dress to make the blond forget all about his mere presence.

Why had he ever expected anything else?

"Oh my _god_, I mean, just look at this! I thought you were supposed to be _helping_ him, not ruin all of his hard work! Can you believe this mess? Look, Chelle!" Rinoa jeered and passed Seifer's notebook on to her friends, who immediately commenced an annoying tirade of snide comments and cries of outrage over Squall's efforts.

Rinoa, on the other hand, quietly wrapped her arm more tightly around Seifer's, beaming at the blond with a smile that was much too calculating for her pretty features.

It was then that Seifer finally realized that shit was about to hit the fan.

_'Ah, fuck.'_

Seifer had seen it coming, but he was still surprised when Squall suddenly leaped onto his feet and harshly picked up his backpack and helmet. The brunette didn't say a single word to him nor them; all he did was throw his book bag onto his shoulder and stalk off towards the school building.

"... S-Squall! Hey! _Wait_!"

Realizing that he had just royally fucked up his one-time opportunity to get closer to Squall, the blond didn't waste another thought on the girls by his side when he jumped up and took after the pissed off brunette with only seconds to spare. Squall was distancing himself quickly, and the dark haired male seemingly had no intentions of slowing down anytime soon.

"Squall! Squall, wait!" Seifer yelled across the school yard. "Squall! C'mon, dude, wait the fuck up!"

Very soon, Seifer realized that he may as well have been speaking a foreign language. Squall continued to walk away from him, ignoring his calls, and he wasn't going to stop unless somebody would _make_ him. Grunting, Seifer picked up his pace until he had come up closely behind the furious youth. The moment he was within the brunette's reach, he curled his hand around Squall's left upper arm and spun him around with more force than he had originally intended.

Squall gasped angrily at the gesture, immediately trying to free himself from Seifer's hold, but the blond was unwilling to let him run off yet another time. Honestly, he was beyond fed up with the brunette's touchy, grumpy attitude. At the same time, he wanted to make sure that Squall would at least be pissed at the girls and not at him.

"Take your fucking hands off me!" the brunette in front of him spat, angrily swiping out at Seifer's arm.

"Chill the fuck out, Squall," Seifer bit back, reflexively tightening his grasp. "Seriously, you're acting like a brat! What the hell's wrong?"

The younger boy was glaring at him for all he was worth, his skin white with fury. An icy spark had come alight in his gale grey orbs, and they were narrow below dark brows.

Seifer didn't think that he had ever seen the boy this angry, and he'd already had the unfortunate pleasure of experiencing a taste of Squall's rage on several occasions.

This was nothing like it.

"Take your hands off me," Squall repeated slowly, his voice now sharper than the edge of a razor's blade.

"The fuck I will," the blond retorted, his eyes a sea of green fire as the heat of his blood started to rise. "What the hell is your problem, anyway? Why are you running off like this? What happened?"

"What the fuck ever!" Squall spat. "Get your hands off me, asshole!"

Seifer wanted to punch him for his attitude.

"Don't fucking 'whatever' me, punk!" he snarled, yanking on the brunette's arm. "What the fuck's going on? Did someone have a piss fest in your Cheerios this morning, or what? Huh? Please, do enlighten me."

"You don't tell me what the fuck I can or can't do, Almasy!" Squall screamed back. "Piss off and go back to your ditzy little girlfriend!"

"She's not my-"

And mid-shout, Seifer finally understood. Squall's teeth were gritted behind lips that were thinned to a line, and his eyes were dominated by a look of pure loathing. That image wasn't so entirely unusual in itself, but the blond had finally noted the other, much different emotion that had appeared on Squall's handsome face and crept into his voice. Honestly, it was too good to be true. Seifer almost didn't dare to believe it.

Without his own volition, his lips smoothed into a much more satisfied version of his trademark smirk.

"Hold on..." the blond said, his voice suddenly very husky and low, shadowed with surprise. "I get it. You're _jealous_, aren't you? That's what it is. You're jealous of _her_."

Squall's eyes snapped wide in shock at that ballsy statement, and his lips opened and closed in the frantic search for words or explanations that clearly had no intentions of popping up in his mind. Dozens of arrogant come-backs echoed loudly inside his head, but none of them seemed any useful at all. He suddenly looked like a deer caught in the headlights, defenseless and completely stripped of all excuses and pretense.

The blond was sure that he had hit the nail smack on the head.

"Squall..." Seifer cooed with a pleased undertone, tasting the name on his tongue in a whole new flavor.

He was testing the waters much too daringly as his ego triumphed over his reason, and he didn't even realize how much he screwed up right that very moment.

Squall's breathing stilled. Seifer's fingers had stopped digging into his arm like ironclad vices and were now pressing more gently against his skin, rubbing it almost affectionately, but it didn't make a difference; the blond's cocky, self-serving words had been a verbal punch in the face.

Seifer, on the other hand, couldn't have felt any more content with himself. Honestly, he couldn't believe his own, stupid luck. Squall was actually _jealous_ - an emotion that he had hardly thought the cold-hearted brunette capable of feeling. Yet, Seifer believed that Squall's flustered reaction over being confronted with his own jealousy was all the confirmation he could possibly need.

_'He was pissed because she was there... pissed because I was paying attention to **her**. He couldn't fucking stand it.'_

The brunette knew it, too; he knew what Seifer was thinking. Blood shot to his cheeks at the realization of what he had unconsciously given away, and the thought of what Seifer was obviously interpreting into everything that impulse had driven him to say. Trembling with rage and embarrassment, he took an abrupt half-step backwards, out of Seifer's reach, his face hard as stone.

"Fuck you!" Squall finally shouted when his voice returned to him at last, and the breathless, spiteful words were interlaced with deepest hurt.

The self-content smirk was wiped clean from Seifer's face the same instant he took account of the broken look on Squall's face, and he finally understood that he had gone way too far.

Squall spun around, finally free from the blond's offending hold, and as he rushed down the path towards the school building, he had no intentions of ever looking back. His heart was pounding in his chest, racing hard and fast with anger and shame. He wanted to beat Seifer to the ground for his arrogance, but at this point, the urge to simply get away from the whole situation was dominating over everything else. Seifer's words - his display of cocky ignorance - had hurt Squall much more deeply than the brunette was willing to admit. He was no fucking toy that the blond could just play with however the hell he pleased, kicking him around just to get a rise out of him; he had feelings, too, even if he rarely ever put them on display.

Meanwhile, Seifer watched the brunette running away from him, but this time, he did nothing to stop him. His own mind was suddenly a mess of disjointed thoughts that no longer made any sense at all. He was so confused. Whatever he had said or done had obviously hurt Squall's feelings, and that had by no means been his intention. Something inside of him had flipped a fucking lid at the idea of Squall being jealous - at the idea of the brunette wanting his undivided attention. Confronting Squall about it, however, had apparently been the wrong measure to take.

_'Yeah, you fucking dumbass. Look what your stupid ego trip got you. Fuck.'_

Seifer would have probably banged his head square into the next brick wall, hadn't it been for Rinoa and her chattering friends suddenly stepping up behind him. The dark haired girl was holding his backpack and his notebook, and her face was fashionably bored.

"Gosh, what's_ his_ problem, anyway?" she asked, her voice annoyed as she motioned into the direction that Squall had chosen for his hurried escape. "He is _so_ touchy, it's ridiculous. What a crybaby. Seriously, Seifer, don't even worry about him."

The blond stared blankly down the paved path that Squall had disappeared on. He felt like such a complete fucking idiot. He was no longer sure whether his impression of the brunette's state of mind had really been all that correct; who was he to judge whether Squall had been jealous or not? He hardly knew the guy. Maybe he had just been seeing things that he had _wanted_ to see. But of course, he'd been unable to keep his big mouth shut, and now Squall would be all too aware of his interest. After all, he had been blatantly obvious, considering he'd been rubbing on the dude's arm and whatnot.

"_Hellooo?_ Seifer!"

Irritated, he swung his neck around, glaring at the brunette girl at his side. She shoved his belongings into his hands, while igniting the sweetest of smiles upon her rose colored lips.

"You forgot these."

"Right..." he bit, trying to keep himself from punching her square in the face.

It nearly took more self-control than he had in stock.

"Well then, let's go to class. Okay?"

Without waiting for his reaction, she hooked her arm beneath his, smiling up at him seductively. He felt like thrusting her away from him, but something told him that he had caused enough trouble for one morning's worth. He was surprised that he could produce any rational thought at all, because his ears were still filled with the sound of Squall's shocked voice.

Seifer couldn't believe what he had done. He had wanted to test the waters, and instead he had managed to drown his brilliant fucking self.

What an accomplishment.

Mechanically, he followed the girl's lead to the school building. He knew that Squall would be in class already, probably plotting the best and most efficient way to ignore him for the rest of his life. Seifer had no idea whatsoever how he was going to work his way out of this one. He had managed to piss the brunette off, while at the same time cluing him in on his not-so-platonic, and in fact quite ulterior motives. Chances were, things could only get worse from here on out.

_'Obviously, little Leonhart doesn't swing that way. Should have thought of that before I started loving up on his arm and shit. Fuck me, man. And I actually kinda started to like the guy!'_

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Seifer could hear the bell announcing the beginning of class. He paid no attention to the crowd of students that had gathered in the hallways, nor did he bother to listen to the stupid crap that Rinoa was blabbering on and on about. He was lamenting to himself quietly, trying to think of ways that would effectively appease Squall's wrath, but the most intelligent idea he could come up with was that of a living goat sacrifice.

_'Brilliant fucking idea, Almasy. Not only will he think you're a fag, he'll also think you're a fucking Satan worshipper. Way to go, man. Way to go.'_

Mumbling something disjointed under his breath, Seifer allowed Rinoa to usher him into their classroom, wishing so hard that she would finally shut the fuck up.

For once, his wish was granted.

He managed to shut out all of her pointless, bitchy bickering the very moment that he nailed his gaze to the back of the room.

_'... Aw, fuck.'_

Squall's seat was empty.


	8. Facets Of Love

-:-**  
Chapter 8  
Facets of Love**

_"Guess it's really no surprise that everybody's so fucking sick of you."_  
-:-

Circles. Squares. Rectangles. Ellipses. Triangles.

Any figure ever captured on a piece of canvas could be reduced to such simple shapes. It was so easy, really. There was nothing insubstantial or magical about it. All it took was focus and a keen eye. Squall Leonhart was capable of spotting the simplest of shapes in the most complex of pictures. He would strip them down, stroke by stroke, layer by layer, until he could see and understand their very scaffold, essence and heart.

Humans and their intricate emotions, on the other hand, did not seem to function that way.

He had tried to understand once... a long time ago, when his childish innocence hadn't yet been completely ripped to pieces. He had put honest effort into trying to comprehend why humans did the things they did, why they made certain choices – stepping across certain boundaries and recoiling from others.

He had _tried_ to _understand_.

Their reasons. Their excuses.

There were things, however, that would never make sense to him, no matter how much he raked his mind for common arguments that sounded nothing short of selfish, false and hypocritical to his ears. They were arguments that some people would make up – arguments that only served as excuses for crimes that were worthy of imprisonment.

He came to ask himself whether certain gruesome actions had been torn from the pages of reason and morality altogether. There would never be any reasons or explanations. Perhaps, he thought, some people simply didn't care about the damage and pain that they caused others. Perhaps they only cared about themselves and their own hedonistic, quick-lived pleasure.

He didn't really know.

Maybe he didn't even _want_ to know.

Either way, it didn't matter. They were questions that he had asked himself many, many times, but he knew that he would never understand, and he knew that nobody would ever care what he thought. So he'd stopped wondering, and he'd stopped trusting, and in some way, his childhood had come to a tragic end.

And yet he would never even complain.

Slowly, Squall ran his index finger across the coarse, coal-dusted surface of his sketch pad, smudging some patches of carefully placed graphite that still looked too harsh to him. He was sitting at the desk in his room, his legs resting perfectly parallel to each other on the black, cushioned seat of his chair; their muscles weren't moving at all, unlike Squall's slate blue eyes that scanned over the drawing before them restlessly.

Squall was so tired. His legs and eyes were burning from the day's strain; it had been rough, to say the least, and it wasn't bound to get any easier, either. It was barely 6:00pm, but he had been running and driving around aimlessly for the greater part of the past eleven hours. He wasn't one to skip school for no good reason, but he had found himself incapable of facing Seifer in class that morning. For some reason, the blond's words had really struck a nerve.

In the end, the brunette had paced pointless patterns all over town and hadn't returned home until late afternoon. He had told his mother some random story about a make-up track practice, which she had believed without question.

She didn't know that he had quit track over a year ago.

Sighing, he adjusted the tilt of his head, turning it aside just slightly. The evening sun was settling low on the horizon and dancing in streaks through the spotless glass of his windows, etching into his narrowed blue eyes. It was making it difficult for him to continue drawing. He could have pulled down the blinds, of course, but... he didn't really want to.

He hated the dark.

As he languidly contemplated the perfect position for the ears of his current drawing's main subject, he suddenly heard the door to his room being pushed open and a pair of small feet tripling across the fluffy, light grey carpet.

"Squally! Squally!"

He reeled around in his chair, spinning the seat as he turned in order to face his beloved younger sister, who was standing in the middle of the room before him. Her name was Ellone, Ell for short, and she was very proud of the fact that she had just recently turned five. She was the most adorable thing he'd ever laid his eyes on, the pride of the family and Squall's dearest person in the world – closely followed by his mother.

He would have died for her, not just once but a hundred times over, and in some horrible way, he already had.

Anyone who ever met the two siblings would emphasize how very much they looked alike: they had the same sleek, dark brown hair and the same finely cut faces, and their skin was an identical shade of unblemished ivory. Ellone's eyes were darker than Squall's, however – a marginal difference that could have given away the fact that they were not full blood relatives.

Squall couldn't help but smile affectionately at her cute outfit – a white and blue cotton dress, embroidered with a large, green ribbon at the small of her back. Their mother had woven her chin length hair into two braids that bounced from her head like pigtails would, pulled together by narrow ribbons of the same kind and color as her dress' pretty accessory. She was beaming up at her big brother fondly, her favorite doll clutched in one tiny hand.

The sight of her almost broke Squall's heart.

"Hey, Ell," he greeted her softly, angling himself down to her so that they were at about the same eye level. "What's up?"

"Big brother," she giggled, tip-toeing past him with a bright, almost cheeky smile, "Are you painting? What is it?"

Curiously, Ellone pushed herself up along the table as far as she could, trying to catch a better view of the drawing her older brother had been working on. She was hardly taller than his desk, but compensated for that handicap with fierce determination.

With his lips steadily curving into a kind smile, Squall lifted his sister upon his lap and allowed her to bend over his sketch pad, touching it with her small and still quite clumsy hands. Ellone looked at the picture in awe, tracing some coal smeared edges with her short, curious fingers. Squall chuckled at her hands that were now dirty with charcoal, and he carefully rubbed the black residue from her soft skin.

She hardly even noticed that gesture of kindness.

"It's pretty," Ell finally said, turning around to him and fixing him with her dark brown eyes. "Is it a lion?"

"Yeah."

Smiling, she settled back into his lap and nuzzled against his chest. She knew how much her big brother liked lions. Most of the stuff scattered about neatly in Squall's room was either related to school, lions or his artwork. There was also a silver pendant in the shape of a lion's head that Raine and Ellone had given the brunette for his sixteenth birthday, and Squall actually wore it almost every day, though he usually chose to conceal it beneath the collar of his shirts.

"Oh, there you are, sweetie. Mm... I should have known."

Again, Squall turned his head around to look at the door, and he could feel Ellone mirroring the motion in his arms. In the middle of the doorway stood their mother, Raine, a large briefcase clamped loosely beneath her left arm. She was dressed casually, wearing plain dark blue jeans and a white, lace-trimmed shirt. Her long, oak brown hair was pushed out of her face with a simple white silk bandana that Squall had given her for her last wedding anniversary.

"We need to get going, Ell," Raine playfully chided her daughter. "We'll be late."

"I just wanted to see Squally's painting," the girl declared as her lips jutted into a pout and she reluctantly slid off her brother's lap to the floor. "It's pretty, Mommy! Come look!"

Squall absent-mindedly smoothed out the wrinkles that had been etched into Ell's dress from sitting curled up on his legs, while glancing at his mother as she stepped up to his desk. She looked over his shoulder keenly, placing a hand upon it gently as she did so.

"Oh, you're right, Ell! That's beautiful, Squall. I can't wait 'til you're done with it! You'll definitely have to let me frame it once it's finished."

"We don't have any more room for stupid sketches of mine," Squall objected immediately, trying and yet failing to sound gruff.

"Oh, I'm sure I'll find a spot somewhere, don't you worry about that," she replied light-heartedly, giggling at his wry grimace. "And your sketches are _not_ stupid! I wish you'd quit saying that. I love everything you draw, Squall, you have so much talent. You really have no reason to be so modest, honey."

Shrugging, Squall glared at the piece of paper in front of him. He really saw nothing special or praiseworthy about his work. He didn't draw to please or impress anyone, anyway, so he couldn't have cared less. For some reason, however, his mother thought his artwork needy of exhibition, and she didn't mind at all that their home started to resemble a fully fledged lion clan's den more than the classy, suburban house that it was.

Oh yes - Raine loved her son from the very bottom of her heart, and there was nothing that she wouldn't have done to let him know that she was so very proud of him.

Nothing whatsoever.

"Well, Ell and I need to be going, dear. If you and your Dad get hungry, there's lasagna in the fridge. Okay?"

The dark haired teenager nodded quietly, carefully refusing to meet his mother's cobalt hued eyes. Instead, his gaze strayed to the pair of earrings she was wearing – expensive diamonds in the smooth shape of teardrops, given to her by her dear husband as one of his random, ridiculously expensive gifts.

Squall could barely restrain a snort of disgust.

"Okay," he finally replied, his voice blanched of any emotions.

"Just put it in the oven for about a half hour, that should do," Raine continued. "And put some Italian seasoning on it before you do, sweetie. It'll taste better. You can handle it, right?"

"... Right."

_'Of course I can. I've been handling it for years.'_

He tried to squash the bitter thought immediately, but it was getting more and more difficult to banish his feelings to the back of his mind. Though he liked to deny it, he was, after all, just a mere teenager and the things that he "handled" would have been enough to make grown men cry.

Well, if certain people didn't care that he had barely transcended from childhood, why should he? In his eyes he was a fully fledged man, responsible for the safety and well-being of the people he loved.

Squall was willing to pay any price to ensure his family's happiness, no matter how painful, and he had the scars to prove it, too.

"Okay, well... see you in a few hours then, Squall. Have fun painting, okay?"

She gave him a small, loving peck on the cheek, eliciting a weak smile to spill from his pale, ruby colored lips and die clean again almost right away. Inwardly, Squall was flinching at the gentleness of her touch.

For some reason, this whole ordeal of seeing his mother and sister off for the night was more troubling than usual. He wondered if it had anything to do with his fight with Seifer that morning, but he tried to ignore the notion.

Suddenly, the youth noticed a flash of concern crossing the calm, brilliant blue surface of his mother's eyes as she cocked her head aside, causing her hair to cascade down the right side of her shoulder like a waterfall. He realized right away that his face had given away just a little too much emotion.

"Is everything alright, sweetie?" she asked, worry kindling with her voice. "You look sad somehow. Did something happen at school?"

"No. I'm fine, Mom," he lied quickly, avoiding her meticulous gaze. "Just tired."

Of course, that statement only made too much sense to her. After all, she had been a high school senior once, too, even if she had never managed to graduate.

"I understand, dear. You should go to bed early tonight. Don't overwork yourself, okay?"

"I won't... don't worry."

Gently, she cupped the side of his face, smiling down upon him with a tenderness that only a mother's heart could bear. For a very short moment, Squall allowed himself to lean into the warmth and natural comfort that her skin had to offer, but he withdrew again almost right away. She accepted him shying away as she always did, blaming it on puberty and his need to be treated like a grown man.

Still, Raine missed the days when he had come and cuddled with her in bed, telling her animated stories of lions and dragons and all the other colorful things that his childish imagination had come up with. Somehow, those days had glistened with a different kind of brightness; a sort of happiness that she no longer saw in his calm, serious eyes. She didn't quite understand; a few years ago, their life had been so much rougher.

Well, that time was over. Finally over.

"You'll be late," Squall stated quietly, his elbows resting on his knees as he glanced at Ell who was twirling in circles around his room like a ballerina. "You'd better go before she gets sick or something..."

"Oh. Yes, you're right, honey," Raine replied, abruptly torn from her reminiscences. "Come on, Ell, let's get going. I'm sure Tiffany and the others are waiting already."

"Oooh. Okay... Bye-bye, Squally!"

"See ya," Squall murmured, hoisting a false smile onto his face once more. "Have fun."

He watched the two women of his life exiting his room hand in hand and Raine pulling the door shut behind them carefully. Something inside the brunette's chest was aching at the sight, but he shoved the feeling aside brutally. The smile had already faded from the surface of his lips when he turned to face his drawing again, gazing at the tiny fingerprints that Ell had left behind.

She was so incredibly precious.

He'd do anything to protect her. Anything whatsoever.

His eyebrows slowly laced together and wrinkled his forehead in a dark scowl, but he kept his thoughts from straying to anything _but_ the artistic task at hand; no little sister, no caring mother, no ornery blond with fascinating emerald eyes, no looming shadows cast over his face, no unwelcome heat threatening to suffocate him as he screamed into the mattress.

He wanted to think only of his artwork and of nothing else.

He knew he would have gone insane otherwise.

Outside, there was a thudding noise of two car doors being thrown shut, and ultimately the sound of his mother starting the engine of their family van. He knew exactly when she'd be pulling out of the driveway and onto the road to head downtown to her kindergarten council meeting. He knew, because he had counted down the precise amount of minutes and seconds that it took so many, many times.

His forehead was beginning to ache and his muscles were snapping tight as he heard the sound of the car fading away, but he kept glaring at the drawing before him almost fiercely, not blinking even once. His right hand was clutching a stick of coal like a weapon, the opaque blackness of it smearing against the inside of his palm and his fingers. Eventually, the sketch begun to dance and blur before his eyes, which had begun to sting and water from the strain of not being permitted to blink.

Finally, Squall lowered his lids halfway over a surface of blue that had dimmed to a thick grey, and he swallowed hard against the sour lump caught in his throat. He was forcing himself to focus and keep his mind from spinning out of orbit, but the task was growing more and more unbearable as his time steadily ran out. The pooled up tears were threatening to glide down his cheeks in silence, but he brushed them away with the back of his hand, leaving only a faint smudge of coal on his skin as he performed the hasty movement.

He couldn't keep his arm from trembling, though.

_'Mom... I... I can't do this anymore... I'm...'_

Suppressing a startled sob, he realized that he couldn't tell her – not even in the safe captivity of his own mind. He didn't know whether to feel brave or pathetic for it. Somehow, it was probably a little bit of both, and the absurdity of that feeling was the only thing that kept him going.

Kept him_ breathing_.

Beneath half-lidded eyes, he looked upon the lion's counterfeit on his sketchpad. The beast's gaze was as piercing and hypnotic as a certain someone's – only the color was entirely off.

Squall's features twisted as he clenched his hands into desperate fists, chasing away the memory of Seifer's hurtful words.

_'You know nothing about me. Nothing at all!'_

He drew a wet and defiant breath through his nose, biting down hard upon his teeth. Then he sat quietly in his chair, his muscles entirely motionless as he was waiting, and only when he heard the door to his room being pushed open slowly once more, he finally allowed his eyes to shut completely.

* * *

That night, Seifer was lying awake for a very long time. He wasn't used to worrying about anything or anyone, but the image of Squall's thunderstruck face just wouldn't let him go. The guy had looked as if Seifer had somehow ripped out and violated his innermost secret.

He had looked so..._ hurt_.

Seifer had spent almost the entire day looking for Squall. He had searched the school grounds during each and every one of his breaks, and he had even stopped by "Ward's" after classes. Of course, that dumb fuck named Raijin hadn't told him much of anything – only that Squall had called in sick and that he, Rai, could not hand the brunette's phone number or address to Seifer as it was "against the law." And, go figure, Selphie hadn't been at work to assist the blond in any way.

Seifer had felt like breaking something at the absurdity of it all.

All the while, he had been scared that Squall would do something stupid, but he hadn't known why he would assume such a thing, and he had ignored the reason why he cared in the first place. Admittedly, he did feel like an arrogant prick for accusing Squall of being jealous and teasing him for it, but it was slightly difficult to apologize to someone who was nowhere to be found.

Of course, chances were that Squall was merely pissed out of his mind and pouting in some dark, arctic cavern on sweet old Planet Grouch, but for some reason, Seifer knew better than that. He didn't believe in empathy or soul mates or any of that esoteric bullshit, but part of him sensed that Squall was hurting or in trouble.

Somehow. For something.

That was all that he knew.

Staring at the white ceiling hovering ominously above his head, Seifer was sprawled out on the covers of his bed in only a pair of black boxer shorts. His heart was tight in his chest, aching with guilt and general numbness. He wondered just what he had been thinking that morning, confronting Squall the way he had. He should have known better, taking Squall's withdrawn nature into account and all. Maybe it was to blame on the fact that Seifer always felt strangely detached from reality whenever he was in the brunette's presence; a light, fluffy, antsy kind of feeling that pushed him to make incredibly stupid mistakes.

It was something he had never really experienced before.

Sighing, he flipped onto his stomach and buried his face in the squashy depths of his pillow. As he closed his eyes and focused on nothing but the dull sound of his breathing, he wondered where Squall was at that very moment – whether he was okay. He knew that he shouldn't care so much, but at the same time, there wasn't a damned thing he could have done about it.

Quietly, he wrapped his arms around his pillow and stared through his window at the crescent shape of the half moon in the black, star spangled night sky.

_'Damn it, Squall, just be alright, okay? Be pissed at me all you want, but don't do anything stupid. That's all I'm asking... I really don't give a fuck about anything else at this point.'_

And somehow, with his budding feelings towards Squall had come a newfound sense of humility.

* * *

"Yo, Seif!"

Grunting, Seifer turned around. He had barely slid out of the seat of his truck and planted his feet on the ground, his backpack in one hand, when Irvine's best buddy Zell had already blurted out his name and stepped out of the crowd of students gathering in the parking lot of their school.

"What?" the taller blond groaned rudely, too tired to say much else.

He'd only gotten a couple hours of lousy sleep that night. The last thing he felt like doing was conversing with the obnoxious wannabe martial artist freak show.

Needless to say, his sentiments displayed on his face quite clearly.

Zell frowned at him accordingly, but there seemed to be something on his mind that prevented him from throwing a fit over Seifer's not-so-friendly greeting. He was bouncing on the balls of his feet as usual, incapable of standing still for just one minute. If anything, it annoyed the fuck out of Seifer, and he wasn't polite enough to conceal it.

"Man, cheerful greeting," Zell sighed, pouring on the sarcasm, but he changed the subject almost right away. "Anyway, hey listen, weren't ya looking for Leonhart yesterday?"

"Uh, yeah?" Seifer answered slowly, his interest piqued distinctly. "Why?"

"Well, just thought I'd let ya know that he pulled into the parking lot about a minute ago."

Emerald eyes slit at Zell's words, and the smaller blond gulped at the unsettling expression. Frankly, he wasn't sure how much he liked this Almasy character. The dude was five kinds of weird.

"Where?" Seifer merely spat, his gaze already roaming around for a sight of Squall.

"Uh..." Zell started, then thrust his hand out to the right of them. "His bike's over there. Hey, Seifer, what's going-"

Seifer, however, had already sprinted off and left Zell clean in the dust to stare in confusion at the now empty spot before him.

"— on?"

Sighing in resignation, the blond haired youth turned around and crossed his arms in front of his chest, strutting towards the school building under scandalized, incoherent muttering.

"Jerk. He could have at least said thanks. What is it with him and his fat head, anyway? No clue why Irvine even talks to him. If ya ask me, he's just another dumb jock whose head has been hit by a football one too many times. I kinda feel sorry for Squall. What business do they have together, anyway? Giving each other lessons in how to become even bigger pricks? Maybe it's a competition, you know, like a Jerkoff Pageant? Must be. Not sure who'd win. Not like I care, anyway! Hah. Maybe-"

Meanwhile, at the far end of the parking lot, Seifer had finally caught a glimpse of Squall's scrawny figure and was fast closing in on it. The brunette was kind of bent over his bike, and Seifer thought that he looked a bit odd from a distance, but that impression was quickly overrun by anger and nervousness, which caused his pulse to soar. He suddenly felt very upset over something, but he had no idea what it was.

By the time he had reached Squall, the brunette had squatted down next to his bike and was rifling through his backpack. Strangely enough, the first thing that Seifer noticed about him was the unusual shirt that he was wearing – black, long-sleeved and embellished with narrow, stylized white crosses on each arm. Like himself, Squall was also dressed in dark blue jeans and heavy boots, but Seifer found his own shirt much more cheerful in nature than the brunette's – red and white, with his favorite sports company's logo stitched on the chest.

While Seifer was still examining Squall's attire, the brunette had grown quite aware of the other youth's presence and slowly cocked his head into his neck. When his dark grey eyes collided with Seifer's from over his shoulder, the blond found himself strangely deprived of words. Squall's face was a tad paler than the day before, his gaze cold and unkind. A bluish tint had crept into the usual ivory color of the delicate skin beneath Squall's eyes, giving away the fact that he had probably gotten even less sleep than Seifer had.

"What the hell do _you _want?" the brunette finally growled, his hands tight around the strap of his book bag as he slowly stood up.

His movements were almost mechanical and looked unnaturally strained. Somehow, the picture seemed familiar, but Seifer didn't have enough time to contemplate on it any further, because Squall looked about ready to rip his heart out of his very chest - still beating or not. If he really wanted to apologize, he thought, his best bet was to do it quickly.

"I was looking for you," Seifer started, carefully choosing his words. "Erh, yesterday, I mean. Well, today, too, I guess, but..."

"And?"

The incredible coldness in Squall's voice threw Seifer off. He had kind of expected the brunette to still be angry at him, but the pure, unadulterated disdain in his eyes came as a bit of a surprise. The little voice inside Seifer's head told him to walk away from this conversation while he still could without causing too much damage, but...

"_And_ I was worried about you, idiot," Seifer responded against his better knowledge, crossing his arms in front of his chest defensively. "I mean, you looked pretty upset yesterday, and I had no idea where you ran off to. You didn't even show up for class. I was looking all over for ya, and I really-"

"Cry me a fucking river."

Blinking, Seifer stared down upon the shorter boy who now pushed past him without heeding him with so much as another look. Squall's message had been clear enough, but something about it didn't sit right with Seifer.

Frowning, he decided that he wasn't going to be stood up again – not after everything that had happened. Not after losing a fucking night of sleep over this.

"_Hold it_," he bit warningly, stepping in front of Squall before the dark haired teen could have walked away.

The brunette glared at him for the interruption, a scowl creasing his almost too pretty features. Squall had no nerve for this encounter right now - he needed to get away from the nosy blond, before it was too late. Seifer, however, was unwilling to let him go and allow him to cool off; the blond was playing with fire by holding Squall back, and he didn't even realize it.

"At least listen to me," the older teen urged, his voice sharper now than before. "I mean, I searched the whole fucking town for you, you could at least-"

"Look, I don't give a rat's ass about you or what you did," Squall cut him off rudely, his words cold and hard and wounding. "I didn't ask you to go looking for me, alright? I don't want anything to do with you. Are you really too fucking stupid to get that?"

Seifer was robbed of all patience at the insult and Squall's openly displayed hostility. The brunette had definitely struck a nerve. For fuck's sake, Seifer was honestly trying to apologize here, but Squall was using the opportunity to make snide, smart-ass little comments like that. The guy was being a downright bitch. If Seifer had ever found the dark haired teen attractive or worthy of concern, he had certainly forgotten about it by now.

"The fuck is your problem, anyway?" Seifer growled and stepped up to Squall. "Seriously, tell me, 'cause I don't fuckin' get it."

He could feel his sense of reason slowly withering away, but at this point, he didn't care too much anymore. All night, he had pounded his brain for a good way to apologize to Squall and make everything right, but the brunette had smashed his honest efforts just like that. Maybe he really was a snooty, heartless bastard like everyone else had claimed.

"What my problem is? _You_ are, Almasy," Squall finally hissed, the words drenched with spite. "You're the most annoying motherfucker I've ever come across. Do me a favor and go bitch to someone who actually gives a _fuck_ about what you have to say!"

If it hadn't been for the fact that Seifer had suddenly noticed the crowd of students gathering around them, each of them curiously following the scene, he probably would have punched the brunette to the ground right then and there. He couldn't even begin to describe how pissed and upset he felt that very moment. Just what was that little punk thinking, talking to him like that? Granted, he had fucked up the day before, but hell, Squall wouldn't even give him the whiff of a chance to apologize. The bitch was less compassionate than a rock.

And then, he saw _her_ – or rather, his perfect chance to hit Squall in the face without actually laying so much as a finger on him. Rinoa and her friend Michelle were standing with the other students, witnessing their confrontation with curiosity. She looked right at him, brown hair dancing into her face as she smiled weakly and turned her head to whisper to her friend. Seifer could tell that her and Squall had a history of some kind, and if anything, he'd use that knowledge to his advantage.

His jade green gaze snapped back to Squall, to the chill in his eyes and the darkness in his face, and finally, Seifer allowed his pride to take over completely.

"You know what, Leonhart," he cooed with a nasty smirk, leaning in to the brunette in a provocative manner that caused Squall to edge his head back nervously, "I think that's _exactly _what I'm gonna do. I don't have time for your stupid little hissy fits. I mean, there's gotta be someone around here who doesn't act like they just fucking hit puberty! See, here's a lil newsflash for ya: you're nothing but a stuck up, whiny little wanker with a whole fuck load of issues! Guess it's really no surprise that everybody's so _fucking_ sick of you."

With that, he circled Squall's frozen figure, still grinning smugly. When he walked up to Rinoa, wrapping one arm around her hips and ushering her to the school building, he couldn't help but feel incredibly pleased with himself. The fact that the other kids were congratulating him for "slapping the ice princess into place" only added to his satisfaction, and he didn't even mind Rinoa giggling and talking him senseless about her plans for their night out at the club.

Had he looked back just once, he probably would have seen the hurt rippling across dark grey eyes as they watched him disappearing into the crowd with the girl in his arms, but whether Seifer would have cared or not was an entirely different story.

Squall, however, was slowly breaking apart on the inside, knowing damn well that he had just bitched away the one person that had seemed genuinely interested in him. The blond's words had stung, but his actions even more so.

But while he was fighting for composure and tried to keep his straight face from crumpling as everything around him continued to move and fall to pieces, he also found himself clawing for defiance. Almasy's opinion didn't matter. Him walking away didn't matter._ Nothing_ at this godforsaken school really mattered. He didn't want to be friends with any of these rejects, anyway. This perfect, unkind solitude was what Squall had wanted all along. _This_ was his own little world that no one had ever truly bothered to be a part of. It was just the way he preferred it. He was finally at peace again; alone with himself, his problems and his violent memories that rippled like a storm beneath the surface of his flat affect.

Calmly, he hooked his backpack onto his right shoulder.

This_ was_ what he wanted.

... Right?

_'... Shit.'_

Wrong.


	9. Playground

-:-**  
Chapter 9  
Playground**

_"You are one hell of a strange guy, Squall Leonhart."_  
-:-

"I said _'no ice'_! And I don't want any fruity ass umbrellas in my drink either, got that?"

"Oh, right. My bad, dude."

"Yeah, whatever. Hope you'll at least manage not to mess up the fuckin' daiquiri. Dumbass."

Scowling, Seifer leaned onto the booze-splashed bar counter before him. It was sticky, dirty and smelled accordingly, but the blond was all too willing to accept that. He had finally managed to get away from Rinoa and Irvine, if only for a few, precious minutes to buy a couple of drinks. He had to get plastered _real _fast, or else he wouldn't make it through the night without turning into a goddamn mass murderer. With a grateful expression, he glanced upon the driver's license in his hand.

_'At least I'm old enough to buy this crap, and loads of it.'_

Heaving a mute sigh, he glanced around the jam-packed club. Disco lights were flittering from every wall and ceiling, causing the blond to feel like an epileptic ready to go into a full blown seizure. The dance floor was crowded with kids that were getting down to some club music, but Seifer felt no urge to join them. Somehow, this day had been nothing short of a disaster. First his sleepless night, then his fight with Squall, and now his splendid night out with Rinoa, Michelle, Irvine, some guy named Trey and another girl called Dari. Frankly, Seifer wasn't exactly fond of any of them. Well, not tonight anyway.

They had met up at the club, "7th Heaven", and Seifer had been extremely glad that Rinoa lived close and had decided to share a ride with her friend Michelle. At least that way Seifer didn't have to pick her up and spend time with her in the small, confined space of his pick-up truck. Just the mere idea sent shivers of abhorrence up his spine.

People were piling up along the bar left and right of him, pushing and shoving like the little kids that they were. Seifer glared at them warningly and ensured that they wouldn't dare to bump into him a second time. With an impatient groan, he turned back to the incompetent bartender.

"Do I have to mix those drinks myself, or what?" he scathed, waving the $20 bill in his hand languidly before his face. "I mean, could you be any fuckin' slower?"

"Uh, no man, you're all set. Here ya go: one margarita, one strawberry daiquiri and a beer."

"Took long enough."

As he slapped the money on the counter, not even minding that the drinks only added up to about $12, he did wonder why he was taking out his anger on every poor, unassuming bastard in his immediate environment. After all, it wasn't this guy's fault that he had just royally blown all his chances of ever hooking up with the darling little ice princess Leonhart.

The thought elicited a bitter taste in his mouth, but Seifer washed it out effectively by downing his margarita in one quick gulp. His throat burnt like hot coals from the alcohol, but he rather liked that feeling. Sighing, he flicked up his disturbingly green gaze to fix the bartender once more.

"On second thought," he cooed with a wry smirk, "Make that _two_ margaritas."

The young man arched one eyebrow wearily, but quickly discarded his concerns over Seifer's eligibility at the sight of another $20 bill. The blond was handing them out like candy.

About two minutes later, Seifer was weaving his way back through the crowd of clubbers, balancing a fresh margarita, the daiquiri for Rinoa and the beer for Irvine in his large hands. He only cussed at the kids blocking his path about three or four more times, and he only wanted to strangle two of them.

His group was located towards the back, in some dark, smoke laden corner. Surprisingly, Rinoa had turned out to be quite the chain smoker. Seifer didn't really give a fuck. First of all, he himself had quit only a few months ago, and secondly, he had no intentions whatsoever of coming anywhere near Rinoa's mouth - not in a sober state, anyway. Once he was drunk, he couldn't have cared less either way.

"Seifer! Over here!"

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes at Rinoa bouncing up and down, waving at him frantically while her breasts threatened to pop out of her baby blue tube top. Not that Irvine next to her seemed to mind the sight at all. Quite contrary, Seifer saw him checking the brunette girl out from beneath the brim of his cowboy hat.

"Here, Seifer!"

_'I **know** you're over there, you dimwit. I'd know even if you **weren't** jumping around like a playmate on crack.'_

He quickly shoved the beer into Irvine's hands and the daiquiri into Rinoa's, only to inhale another large gulp of his margarita.

"Thanks, babe," Rinoa purred, smiling suggestively as she slurped a mouthful of daiquiri through her curly straw.

"Yep," he mumbled in response, leaning against the wall between her and the cowboy to avoid catching an entire eyeful of her sucking skills. After all, the evening had barely just started.

For a lack of better things to do, he cast a long look around. Michelle was still working on her soda, while Trey and Dari were nowhere to be seen. Not that Seifer cared - Trey had looked like a complete jackass with a dick for a brain, and he sure had behaved like one, too. Then again, he was now stuck with these three all on his own, and that idea didn't appeal to him the slightest bit.

"What happened to Dari and Trey, anyway?" he asked lazily, cocking his head into his neck to knock back the rest of his drink.

"Probably making out somewhere," Rinoa explained with a shrug and placed her chin upon his shoulder, twirling her glass in her slender fingers. "They've had the hots for each other for a while now."

"Yeah, that's great, and here's poor me, 'not supposed to be flirting'," Irvine complained in a stretched, whiny voice and let himself flop against the wall by Seifer's side. "It's torture man, torture! I'm serious!"

"Who said you weren't supposed to be flirting? Your mom?" Michelle snickered invidiously, which naturally erected a fit of giggles from her friend Rinoa.

"No, not his fucking mom. A chick he likes," Seifer could hear himself explaining - why, he didn't even know. It wasn't really any of his business.

"Well, _she_ sounds like a prude little bitch!" Michelle retorted with a snort.

Seifer licked the salt from the margarita off his lips, but said nothing. He could have told Michelle that she wouldn't be able to tell a bitch from a classy girl even if she was slapped in her make-up smothered face with the difference, but he decided to just let it go. He didn't remember why he had agreed to this evening in the first place, but he was nonetheless determined to have a good time.

Unfortunately, Rinoa had suddenly decided to share her infinite wisdom with the crowd.

"'Chelle's so right," she declared, brushing some stray strands of hair behind her ear as she leaned against Seifer's arm. "We're young, we're supposed to be having fun, right? Now, how can you have fun when you're supposed to play all prude? That's like, _so_ stupid. You're not _married_, Irvy. Just flirt with whoever you want. It's not like she'll ever find out, anyway."

"You think?" Irvine asked stupidly, and Seifer wanted to bitch slap him for it.

_'What a dumbass,'_ he groaned inwardly. _'This broad's got jelly for brains and he takes her words for pearls of wisdom.'_

"Sure do," Rinoa sang and threw Seifer a suggestive look. "Trust me, we won't tell, sugar."

Seifer merely grimaced at her, hoping his facial expression at least resembled a grin.

"Speaking of fun," the brunette girl continued slowly, her pink lips curving into a wicked smile, "Let's dance, Seif!"

"... Don't you wanna finish your drink first?" he suggested weakly.

"Uhm, no? I'll finish it later. Come on!"

Before he could have resisted, she had already taken the empty glass from his hands and placed it along with her own on a nearby table. As she began dragging him out onto the dance floor, he couldn't help but stare at the extremely short, white skirt she was wearing - or rather, the seemingly endless legs that she was flaunting so openly. She definitely wasn't hard to look at, he had to give her that. If only she'd shut the fuck up for once, she'd at least make a good lay. Lately, Seifer had found himself to be particularly fond of the "silent type."

He thrust a hiss of air through his teeth and twitched at the memory of Squall as he was being pulled through a crowd of wildly dancing teenagers.

If his thoughts kept propelling back to the brunette boy over and over like that, it was a sure sign that he _really_ needed to get tanked.

And thus Seifer did exactly that - he drowned his problems and guilt in a number of beers and margaritas that he soon lost count of. He ground up with both Rinoa and Michelle on the dance floor, finally releasing all his bottled up frustration to some fast techno beat. After a while, he didn't even mind the girls' annoying chattering anymore, nor was he bothered by Irvine's constant whining about Selphie; in fact, he didn't even hear any of it. He danced, drank and eventually kissed Rinoa between cigarettes in one of the many dark corners of the club - until the brunette girl suddenly declared that she needed fresh air.

By then, it was already past 11:00 p.m. and Seifer was definitely buzzed, but he didn't consider that a bad thing by any means. He wasn't drunk to a point where he couldn't walk straight anymore, but he was having a pretty good time. The night was fairly warm and clear when him, Rinoa, Irvine and Michelle stepped outside of the club. The dark haired girl was clinging to his arm in desperate need for support, her heels scraping across the cement as she tried to keep from stumbling.

"Oh, this is _sooo_ much better," she sighed and leaned her head against Seifer's shoulder, smiling as she took in a deep breath.

The blond grinned at her lazily and ran his hand across her enticing ass.

"Is it?" he asked lasciviously.

"Yes," she purred. "Let's go for a walk, there's a park right around the corner."

"You sure you can walk?" Irvine inquired, one of his hands intertwined with Michelle's, which Seifer noted with a snort.

Apparently, the cowboy's "prude" days had ceased long before they had even begun.

"Yes, Irvy, I can!" Rinoa replied defiantly, slurring the words. "Just watch!"

A bit wobbly on her legs and her high heels in particular, she slowly proceeded down the sidewalk. Seifer let out a chuckle and followed her, holding on to her waist as she led her three companions to the dimly lit park a few blocks down the road. The area was beautiful and appropriately snobbish looking for the exquisite neighborhood. Black, cast iron street lanterns lit a pebbled path that wound through perfectly trimmed rows of trees, bushes and exotic flower beds. Rinoa was giggling at Seifer's side, while Irvine and Michelle were walking behind them and talking about something unimportant. The curly-haired blond girl was the only one completely sober, though she didn't necessarily act like it, either.

"Pshh, Seifer," Rinoa suddenly murmured between fits of pointless laughter, "How about you and I go to your place when we're done here?"

"My place?" he asked dumbly, still trying to keep her from falling or twisting her ankle. A night at the Emergency Room with a wasted Rinoa was really the last thing on his agenda tonight.

"Mm-hmm... I told my parents I might sleep over at 'Chelle's, sooo... they won't miss me."

"Hmm... Sounds good to me, babe," Seifer agreed, smirking with satisfaction.

Like he was going to turn down an offer like _that_.

"Oooh, there it is!"

He blinked in confusion at Rinoa's happy outcry and soon discovered the reason for it - a small playground, hidden in a glade that was surrounded by huge, seemingly ancient trees. A large sandbox was shimmering softly in the light shed by the lanterns, and a pair of swings was moving gently back and forth in the currents of the night breeze.

"I love this place, I always came here as a kid!" Rinoa squealed, before she suddenly struggled free from Seifer's embrace and stumbled towards a fairly tall jungle gym.

The blond watched her as she clumsily climbed one of the many ladders, pulled herself up onto a wooden platform and ultimately waved at them from atop a dangerously swerving bridge, assuming something like an Amazon's pose as she thrust one fist into the air triumphantly.

"Ha-ha, I made it! See? I'm up here!" she managed to shout, before she started to laugh again and almost fell forward over the thick rope that served as a railing for the plank bridge construction.

Seifer could hear Michelle and Irvine stepping up next to him, and they were staring at a drunk Rinoa with equally dumbfounded expressions.

"Uhm... what's she doing up there?" the cowboy inquired blankly while tipping his hat into his neck.

"She gets _really_ silly when she's drunk," Michelle explained with a vague shrug. "You might wanna get her down though, Seifer. She's wearing really high heels tonight."

"Yeah... fine..." Seifer agreed in defeat. "I'll go get her."

He walked up to the jungle gym, still smiling, and he could hear the sand grating beneath the soles of his boots. Rinoa was watching him with interest, somehow managing to keep herself upright as she held onto the railing of the bridge.

"Hey, Rin," Seifer shouted, "Come back down. Let's go."

"Nuh-uh! You gotta catch me first!"

Laughing, she tripped across the bridge, sticking out her tongue at him as she did so. Seifer heaved a deep sigh. He was still feeling adventurous, but the cool air was starting to clear his head a bit. He wasn't really in the mood to chase Rinoa all over a fucking playground, but what choice did he have? She seemed determined enough to stay up there all night.

"Alright, I'm getting ya," he threatened.

"Go ahead and trrryyy!" Rinoa lilted, laughing manically.

Seifer walked up to the nearest ladder and curled his hands around the cold metal rungs to start climbing it, carefully placing one foot before the other - until he suddenly stopped and looked down, his face twitching with disgust.

"Ah, _great_."

His hand had slipped across something wet and sticky. Apparently, the gooey substance had been smeared all over the sleek step of the ladder and was now coating his fingertips. It felt gross enough, reminding Seifer immediately why he usually chose to stay away from places like this. He didn't necessarily want to know what exactly he had just touched, but he moved his hand into the light of the nearest street lantern all the same. He expected slug slime, dog shit or dirt from the bottom of some runt's shoes, but what he found was something entirely different.

"What the..."

He stared blankly at the palm of his hand, not understanding why the sheen of liquid he found there was so violently red in color.

_'Red...? Why red?'_

He rubbed his index finger and thumb together slowly, blinking once or twice against the dimness of the light. He knew what he was seeing, but his brain kept telling his eyes that it just didn't make any sense.

"Blood...?"

_'Why blood...? On a playground? What the fuck's going on...? It's still fresh... Did Rinoa hurt herself? No... can't be Rinoa's. She used a different ladder. But then how...'_

Finally, he raised his confused gaze to where the ladder split and trailed off towards the part of the jungle gym that Rinoa was occupying, and to a small, open-faced house that was just a little ways off to his upper right side. Carefully following his instincts, Seifer ascended the rungs until he was just high enough to catch a good view of the wooden hut's interior. He didn't even know what exactly he was looking for, but somehow he had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

This was definitely blood, a good amount of it, too, and chances were it did not belong to an animal.

He glanced into the house, which was barely touched by the lantern's cone of light, but at first he couldn't see much anything. It was dark, and little else but that. He was about to turn away in disappointment, but when his eyesight finally adjusted to the darkness, Seifer almost lost his hold on the ladder.

_Somebody_ was sitting inside the house, curled up to a ball and hidden between the practically impenetrable shadows. Seifer gasped silently as the whole entity of that picture hit him at once.

There was a fucking_ person_ sitting in that hut!

_'What the **fuck**?'_

The wrapped up body seemed to be moving slightly in the corner, but Seifer wasn't entirely sure. Who the fuck was this? A runaway kid? Some bum? He couldn't see much except for the back of the person's head, which was covered in a mess of dark hair, and something white... white shapes that stood out like beacons even in the darkness. Imprinted upon the figure's sleeves, they were oddly shaped crosses that shifted as the person curled his arms more tightly around his knees.

_'Crosses... white crosses... Wait a minute... I've seen this before, I-'_

When he finally remembered, Seifer let go off the ladder.

He landed ass first on the ground with a thud, cursing at the jab of pain that seared through his tailbone at the sharp contact with the sand pit. He quickly forgot all about his rear end, though, when he recalled what he had just seen. His breathing stilled to a crawl as he stared up at the bottom of the hut in a frantic blank.

_'Can't be. It can't be him. I gotta be hallucinating. This isn't-'_

"Seifer, are you okay?"

"Hey man, you alright? What happened? Why'd you fall?"

Apparently, Rinoa had already descended from the jungle gym, because he found her crouching next to him, creasing her brows with concern as she stupidly checked him for broken bones. Irvine had walked up behind him and was readily helping him upon his feet.

The blond's mind was working on light speed as he brushed the sand off his jeans and tried to stay calm. He could not _believe_ what he had discovered up there. That was _Squall's_ shirt he had seen, and _Squall's_ hair, and Squall's...

He froze when he suddenly recalled the blood covering the palm of his hand. Quickly, he clenched it to a fist, hiding it behind his back. He didn't know what to do, and his head was spinning painfully with the adrenaline and the alcohol, but he did know one thing: if that was really Squall up there, then Rinoa and the others could not see him like this, hiding on a playground like a little kid. They would never let him hear the end of it.

No, Seifer had to get rid of them somehow.

"Seifer, what-"

"Let's go," he commanded sharply, before spinning around and trudging off towards the pebbled path.

The other three exchanged confused looks, but quickly followed Seifer's lead. The blond was barreling down the tree-lined trail, only barely restraining himself from falling into a sprint. His heart was pounding in his chest with every step that he took, and his breathing had altered, taken on an erratic, agitated rhythm.

"Seifer! Seifer, wait! What the... Irvine, make him stop! _Seifer_!"

Rinoa was calling out to him, but the blond slowed down only marginally. The shock had cleared his head from the buzz that had been fogging it, but he still couldn't manage to think one straight thought.

_'Maybe it wasn't his blood. Maybe it wasn't even Squall. Maybe I'm making all of this crap up. Maybe it's just the booze getting to my head. Fuck. But what if it **is** his blood? I should have stayed; maybe he's hurt. But he was moving... why would he be hurt, anyway? He wouldn't be hiding in a jungle gym if he was. Unless he hurt himself while trying to get up there. But that's bullshit; it's a fucking playground. But then why... Fuck. I have to get rid of them so I can go back and check to make sure.'_

They had reached the street, and Seifer was heading towards the parking lot where they had left their cars earlier that night. Somewhere behind him, Rinoa was screaming like a mad banshee, but he didn't pay her any mind until she and the others had actually managed to catch up with him and the brunette girl grabbed his arm.

"Why are you going so fast? What's the matter with you?" she yelled at him, her cheeks flushed from the alcohol and anger. Her makeup didn't look nearly as perfect as it once had.

"I'm going home," he stated evenly, avoiding her eyes. "_Alone_."

"W-what? But why? What's wrong all of a sudden?"

"I changed my mind, that's all."

"Why? Because I was playing around a bit? Come on, don't be such a-"

"Look, Rinoa, just go home, alright?" he sighed. "Go with Michelle, or go with Irvine for all that I care. Either way, I'm not taking you."

"But you're drunk, you can't drive!" she exclaimed, her voice high and off pitch.

Snarling, he looked down upon her and swiped his arm out of her grasp. He couldn't believe that he had been making out with her less than an hour ago. Just what had he been thinking?

"You didn't seem to mind my buzz when you were still planning on coming with me," he replied coldly.

"Seriously man, why the sudden rush?" Irvine cut in.

"I gotta go home and fuckin' take care of something, alright?" Seifer growled with a tone of exasperation.

Honestly, he didn't have time for these stupid, childish arguments.

"But-" Rinoa piped up helplessly.

"_No_, Rinoa."

With that, he hit the remote lock for his truck, opened the door and hopped into his seat, starting the engine before he had even bothered to fully close the door again. Irvine, Rinoa and Michelle watched him dumbfounded as he pulled out of the parking lot and onto the road, quickly disappearing around the bend of the next corner.

By then, Seifer had already forgotten all about them. Of course he _wasn't_ going home. He had to get back to that playground without the others noticing what he was doing. Fortunately, most parks had more than just one entrance or exit, and so did this one. After driving around the area for a few minutes, carefully keeping watch for any sign of his friends' cars, he found another cast iron gate that obviously led into the park.

He stopped in a dimly lit alleyway, almost surprised by the sudden silence that surrounded him as he pushed his door ajar. An owl was hooting in a distant treetop and the wind was rustling through the leaves, but other than that, it was perfectly quiet.

With his heart beating almost into his throat, he roamed the backseat of his truck for his first aid case. He had never used it before, and he could only hope that it would stay that way even through the night.

Finally, he found it, and he lost no more time after that. The idea of Squall possibly being hurt caused his skin to break out in goose bumps. Nothing of what he had told the brunette that morning had been true; he _wasn't_ sick of him, nor did he think of him as a whiny little bitch. Somehow, he had just lost his temper, and he was suddenly very afraid that he would have to pay for that mistake.

He locked his vehicle and entered the enveloping darkness of the park, silently following the lead of the lanterns. He had no real concept of where to go; he could merely make vague assumptions based on where him and the others had first commenced their little walk. He was clutching the black, plastic case of the first aid kit tightly in one hand - the one that was still streaked with drying blood.

The sound of his own footsteps was echoing in his ears, but he drowned it out instinctively as soon as he finally spotted the familiar clearing of trees with the playground set in its center. He sent a mute thank-you to the black, star spangled sky, knowing full well that he could as well have searched the park all night and never found this spot again.

Quietly, he crossed from stones onto sand and approached the jungle gym, his mouth suddenly dry and coarse like sandpaper. He didn't know what he would find up in that little hut - whether he would find anything at all. The inside of his fist was growing clammy, and he almost dropped the first aid case as he was trying to ascend the ladder.

His breath was coming heavier with every rung that he conquered, until he had finally reached the top. Gulping, he pushed himself upwards, and he only barely managed not to tumble face first onto the floor, even though he had thought that he'd been prepared for anything.

The person was still sitting there.

Mechanically, Seifer drug his body over the ledge of the hut and inside the small, square-shaped room. The ground beneath him was made of smoothly sanded wood, but even there the blond quickly discovered a few, tiny speckles of blood. The sight did nothing to calm his gradually rising agitation.

Slowly, he leveled his gaze with the motionless figure that was sitting only an arm's length away from him. He doubtlessly remembered the black shirt, the white crosses, the dark blue jeans and the black leather boots from that morning.

That unusual hair, he would have recognized anywhere.

"Squall...?" he asked tentatively, his voice unnaturally brittle. "Hey, is that you, Squall...?"

The brunette was leaning against the wall, his legs drawn close to his chest and his arms wrapped around his knees. His face was turned away from Seifer, buried deep in the crook of his left elbow.

Silently, Seifer set his first aid case on the ground.

"Squall... it's me. Seifer."

Hesitantly, the blond pulled one of his own legs to his chest and skidded over the floor to sit across from the motionless figure. He laced his brows together in concern, unsure of what to do next.

_'Maybe he fell asleep...? What if he's unconscious?'_

"Squall?" he repeated, more firmly now. "Are you awake? Come on, hey, talk to me."

When he again received no response, he unsurely extended one arm. His fingers were gradually reaching for the brunette's leg, but...

"... Go away."

He started at the sound of Squall's voice, and he immediately yanked back his hand. Seifer suddenly realized that he had been holding his breath all this time, and he exhaled very gingerly as his hand clenched back into a fist. Squall still wouldn't look at him.

Finally, the blond cleared his throat and rubbed his thigh in distress. His palms felt cold and sweaty.

"Uh... I... I was wondering if you were okay," he murmured, narrowing his eyes slightly. "There's blood everywhere."

"I don't care."

The blond bit his lip in anxiety, not entirely sure what to make of that statement.

"Whose blood is it? Your's?" he asked slowly.

Squall didn't answer him this time. Seifer could see that he was shifting in his seating position and was wrapping his arms more tightly around his legs. The blond didn't quite know or understand why, but somehow that nervous silence and those stiff movements were answer enough.

"Where are you bleeding?" he inquired calmly, willing his voice to remain steady.

"I'm not."

"I don't believe you."

Another moment of silence ensued, rendering Seifer hesitant as to what to do next. He wanted to approach Squall, but he didn't know how to go about it. He didn't want the brunette to flip again, not when he was possibly injured. He had no idea where Squall was bleeding, or why he would be injured in the first place. Why wasn't he at home or at a doctor's if he was hurt? Why was he hiding out here in the darkness? Why was there blood on the ladder? Where was he bleeding? His hands? And why was he sitting like that, looking like a frightened little kid? Why was he holding his arms at such an awkward angle, why was he pushing his forearms so hard against his knees, why-

_'... Oh, my god.'_

Finally, it hit him.

Once more, Seifer extended his arm, more surely this time, and his hand trailed to the spot where the blond presumed Squall's wrists to be. He didn't even have to search. As soon as he felt the brunette's cool skin against his own, he wrapped his fingers around the narrow limb and pulled it towards himself.

"No! _Ouch_..."

Beneath his fingertips, Seifer could feel the lacerated flesh and the warm sheen of blood covering every inch of skin. Squall had winced and gone stiff at his touch, causing Seifer's breath to hitch and flatten when he fully realized what was going on.

"Ugh... let _go_..."

And Seifer did. He had gotten his answer at last, and he didn't like it at all. In fact, he hated it from the very bottom of his heart.

Squall was curling up to a ball again, pressing both of his wrists against his legs as he slowly rocked back and forth. Although he had only grabbed one of Squall's arms, there wasn't a doubt in Seifer's mind that the other limb looked just as bad as the one he had just touched. He could merely stare at the brunette, too shook up to say or do anything. For the first time in his life, he felt completely at a loss.

He couldn't believe it. Didn't want to believe it. He wanted to simply ignore the fact that this was real. Squall's skin had felt so... _destroyed_. Like someone had slashed into it a dozen times with a goddamn meat cleaver.

_'No... Not "someone". **He** did. He **cut** himself! This is what he's been hiding under those goddamned wristbands all this time! I'm such a fool!'_

Slowly, Seifer pushed himself onto his knees and crawled over to the brunette until he was perched down within inches of him. Squall was breathing shallowly and seemed to be trembling. Very gently, the blond laid one hand on the other youth's shoulder as he bent over him, before using his other to place one palm against Squall's jaw and carefully tilt it upwards.

The brunette's face scared Seifer much more than the blood and shredded bits of skin had. Darkness had drowned out all the blue in Squall's eyes and slicked them with silent tears instead. Squall's skin was so pale that Seifer started to worry over the amount of blood that the brunette might have already lost. There wasn't much splattered about on the jungle gym, but who knew where Squall had been before.

Where he had done this to himself.

"Squall," Seifer said, his voice firm but gentle. "You need help."

"No," the brunette replied, the word weak and almost inaudible. "I don't."

"_Yes_, you do," the older objected stoically. "I have a first aid kit here. I'm gonna stop the bleeding."

He pulled the black case closer, but never took his eyes off Squall. The brunette looked upset, but too physically exhausted to offer much resistance. Then again, it wasn't really defiance that Seifer read in his dark grey orbs - more like embarrassment or guilt.

"Don't worry," Seifer clumsily tried to reassure him. "It's alright."

Of course, it was everything _but_ alright. Seifer knew why people cut their wrists, or at least he believed that he did. People did this to commit suicide – they did it because they didn't want to live anymore. He figured that this wasn't the first time that Squall had hurt himself, and although the brunette was still alive, it didn't really make things any better. The entire concept of it scared the shit out of Seifer, and he wasn't even ashamed of admitting it.

_'Don't panic... you found him in time. He'll be alright. He will be. I'll make fuckin'** sure** that he will be!'_

With a few, swift movements he had opened the small aid case and produced a couple of sterile 4x4's and bandages. For the first time in his life, he was genuinely thankful for the fact that both of his parents were doctors and had taught him all the necessary first aid basics as soon as he had started driving. With a grim expression, he started to wrap the brunette's wrists, ensuring to add an extra roll of bandage each for pressure. He had seen no signs of arterial bleeding, but he wasn't willing to take any chances.

Neither of them spoke a word while Seifer was funneling all his careful concentration on this task. He didn't mind that he smeared blood all over his own hands, but Squall was watching the scene with a strange blankness in his eyes. The thought of struggling against what Seifer was doing didn't even seem to occur to him. He simply stared at the blond in mistrust, studying the serious frown that was dragging on Seifer's bronzed features, and wondering at the gentleness and experience of his touch.

"Okay," Seifer sighed eventually, examining his workmanship. "This should work for right now."

The two boys gazed at each other mutely, devoid of any further things to say. Suddenly, all the bitterness and anger that had echoed between them that morning was forgotten, and all that was left was uncomfortable silence. Seifer honestly did want to say something, but he was still too confused and shocked to trust his voice to hold for longer than a few seconds, and Squall felt too ashamed to try and explain his actions.

Not that there was any kind of explanation that Seifer would have ever understood.

Finally, Seifer managed to change his focus to something other than Squall's almost translucent face. Outside their hut, the night had grown even darker and colder, or perhaps he only imagined that. Either way, he now had a better concept of what to do next.

"Let's go, Squall," he murmured, while closing his first aid kit with a sharp click.

"Go...?" Squall repeated, his voice swaying audibly as his brows slid low over his ash colored eyes.

"Yeah," Seifer nodded. "What? You know I'm not gonna leave you here, right?"

The brunette gave no response, and Seifer regarded him with an encouraging smile as he moved over to the opening of the hut.

"... Come on. I'll help you down."

This time, Seifer managed to descend the ladder without landing square on his ass. Instead, he leaped lightly to the bottom, where he stood patiently and stared up at the hut, waiting for Squall to follow his example.

"Come on," he repeated, already preparing to climb the ladder once more to drag Squall down if need be.

But finally, the soles of Squall's boots appeared over the ledge and the brunette edgily lowered himself onto the ladder, his hands wrapping tightly around the sides. The white bandages stood out like bright beacons against the darkness, providing for an odd and unsettling contrast. Seifer immediately stepped up beneath Squall, ready to catch him in case he would slip or let go.

"I'm not gonna fall," the brunette suddenly stated weakly from up above, a faint trace of his usual, abrasive stubbornness shining through the mesh of hurt.

"Of course not," Seifer replied calmly, but he did not move an inch from his position.

He didn't know how much blood Squall had lost, but right this moment, he didn't trust the brunette's body to hold out much longer. He figured it best to get Squall to a hospital as soon as possible and have him checked out by a professional.

_'... But first he has to get down here.'_

Seifer watched patiently how the dark haired boy was gradually descending the rungs, feigning strength that was no longer there. Squall's narrow wrists in the white wrappings were shaking noticeably.

His feet, however, didn't slip until only about five feet separated him from solid ground.

Squall's ankles hurt as they hit the sandpit at an acute angle, and he almost bit off his tongue at the unexpectedly sharp impact. Somehow, he had managed not to reel over, but the simple reason for that occurred to him as soon as he felt Seifer's hands on the iron ladder beams, right beneath his own ones. In fact, even the blond's strong arms and torso were spooned against him, granting him the essential steadiness that his own muscles couldn't quite come up with anymore.

He stood frozen for a moment, feeling Seifer's chest rising and falling against his back, his mind eradicated of any kind of thought.

"Are you alright?" the blond asked him, his breath hot and vibrant against Squall's cheek as he craned his head around the brunette's, studying his face.

The shorter boy nodded slowly, heat flushing through his body as he stared at the piles of sand to his feet. Seifer's scent now seemed to envelope him like his arms already were. He smelled of alcohol, cigarettes and some sweet, flowery perfume... probably Rinoa's. He had heard both of them earlier on the playground, fooling around with each other. Where was Rinoa now, anyway? Why had Seifer come back by himself? After everything that had happened between them that morning, what did he even care?

The questions and Seifer's scent were causing Squall's head to spin violently, and he groaned under the immense sensational overload.

_'He's... too close...'_

As if Seifer had guessed that the brunette was spiraling into a state of emotional chaos, he suddenly retreated from Squall's rigid form. He had dropped the first aid case when he had seen Squall falling and bent down to pick it back up, dusting it off haphazardly. All the while, he was watching the other youth from the corner of his eyes, but Squall seemed okay for the time being. Except, he was still holding on to that damned ladder...

"Squall?" Seifer asked calmly, one step bringing him back to the motionless boy. "You sure you're alright?"

"... Yeah."

Frowning, the blond looked over his shoulder into the pitch black darkness of the park that was only severed by the faint light of the lanterns. He seriously wondered whether the hurting brunette would make it to his truck in his current state and condition.

"I didn't park very far from here," he mused quietly. "I could carry you."

"No."

Squall slowly stepped away from the ladder, fighting against the buzzing noise in his ears and the imaginary lights that flashed incessantly before his eyes. He knew that Seifer was watching over his every move, and though the concept angered him, he was also sort of... thankful. He felt a strange, alien gratitude for the fact that he wasn't sitting alone in the darkness anymore... that somebody actually cared enough to coax him into stepping outside, away from the shadows and the blood and the violence inside his head. At the same time, it frightened him and he felt incredibly ashamed. There were so many different feelings and emotions struggling within him for recognition, he had no idea what to do next.

"You sure you don't want me to carry you?" Seifer inquired behind him. "You're light, it's really no big-"

"I can _walk,_" Squall severed his offer with a cold, hard growl.

"... Alright."

Admitting defeat for the moment, Seifer attached himself to Squall's side as he led him out of the sand pit and off the playground, never allowing the brunette to stumble quite out of his arm's reach.

"It's this way," he said, pointing down one of the many narrow paths. "It's close."

Squall said nothing, but continued walking in the direction that Seifer had pointed out. He was feeling light-headed from the blood loss - something he was already accustomed to. Perhaps he had gone a little too far tonight... he wasn't sure. His aching wrists were accusing him of insanity, and hell, they probably had a point. In some twisted way, that thought almost amused him.

"Not far anymore," Seifer informed him quietly. "Let me know if you need to stop."

The brunette didn't even know why he was following Seifer. Maybe because he knew he couldn't make it home on his own two legs anymore, or maybe because Seifer had looked at him so... genuinely shocked and _moved_ back there, in the jungle gym. It had been an understandable reaction, of course, but Squall had certainly been surprised at the lack of disgust in Seifer's eyes when the blond had found out the truth - when he had touched his slashed up, mutilated wrists. Why was Seifer so calm? Why hadn't he freaked out yet? It was the least that Squall would have expected from him, or anyone, for that matter. After all, he had once been told that the practice of cutting oneself was sickening and pathetic.

Deep down, he had to agree.

Squall stopped brooding when Seifer finally ushered him out of the park and towards a familiar, bright red truck. For some strange reason, another thought suddenly stirred in Squall's drowsy mind, and he blamed it on his defense mechanisms that worked flawlessly even when his body did not.

"You want to drive...?" he asked skeptically, looking at Seifer for the first time since they had departed from the playground.

The blond angled his head down to him, gazing at him out of those impossibly green eyes. Those intense emerald orbs, paired with his already swerving mind, were enough to cause Squall's temples to spasm. Groaning, he rubbed at them in the faint hopes of easing the pressure.

"Yeah, I do. What about it?" Seifer asked, studying his twitching expression. "What's wrong? Feeling dizzy?"

"No..." Squall lied, biting down upon his teeth as he tried to ignore the lurching sensation in the pit of his stomach. "And you shouldn't drive... you're drunk..."

"Maybe I am, but you're about to reel over," Seifer stated with a soft shrug. "Guess we're shit out of luck."

"You smell like a liquor store... and I've seen you drive when you were _sober_."

"Alright then. Want me to carry you? It's either that or the truck."

Squall stopped massaging his forehead and glared daggers at Seifer instead. There was no humor in the blond's eyes, though - apparently, he was dead serious. Sighing, the brunette dropped his hands to his sides.

"Fine. Drive."

"Good," Seifer nodded in satisfaction, "At least we got that out of the way. Now you just gotta tell me where the nearest hospital is."

Seifer hadn't quite expected for the younger boy to suddenly take a half-step back from him, his eyes wide and flashing panic.

"I'm not going to the hospital!" Squall choked, the hard and yet shaky tone of his voice catching Seifer off guard.

Squall looked scared shitless.

In an attempt of a soothing gesture, Seifer raised his hands into the air, but he couldn't keep his face from crumpling to a disapproving frown.

"Alright, alright! Don't freak out on me," he sighed, before tilting his head in question. "... Why don't you wanna go to the hospital?"

"Because... I don't need to go," Squall explained evasively. "I'll be fine."

"Right. Of course. 'Cause you've done this before," Seifer stated dryly, but not without a hint of reproach to his voice.

Apparently, the brunette could find no appropriate response to that, because he simply dropped his head in silence. His long, dark bangs fell into his face and hid it from view, and somehow, that pathetic picture quenched Seifer's frustration instantly.

"Where did you think I was going to take you, if not to the hospital...?" the blond finally asked gently.

"I don't know..." Squall murmured, his voice trailing off. "Home, I guess..."

"Home? You want to go home looking like _this_?" he inquired, the sad quietness in his tone taking the sting out of the question.

At the same time, he pointed at Squall's haphazardly bandaged wrists, though he knew well that the brunette couldn't see the gesture.

"... No." Squall admitted, suddenly sounding exhausted.

"I didn't think so."

Squall fell silent again, but Seifer had already begun to think of a way to solve this problem. His list of options was running thin, and the one that appealed to him the most would probably cause the brunette to have an epic freak out. Then again, he decided, it was at least worth a shot. One way or another, he had to do _something_, because he certainly wasn't willing to leave Squall out here in the darkness.

"Alright," he said, giving off his best impression of utter confidence, "Get in the truck. I have an idea."

The other teen finally raised his head back up, meeting Seifer's enthusiastic gaze.

"Where are we going?" he asked unsurely.

"My place."

"Your-?" Squall started, his eyes widening once more.

"Yeah," Seifer nodded.

"I'm not go-"

"Alright, look, here's the deal," Seifer interrupted him, "We're either going to the hospital, your place or my place. Those are your three options. I'm not leaving you out here, period. So if you wanna avoid being asked a bunch of nosy questions over why your wrists are looking... the way they're looking... you might wanna come with me to my apartment and at least let me patch them up properly."

Before Squall could have shot the idea down entirely, Seifer simply stepped up to him and fixed him with a look that was burning with hard-headed determination. The brunette remained silent, but stared back at Seifer with thinly veiled mistrust. He had to admit, however, that the blond had made a valid point. Returning home at this hour would prove problematic, as his mother was probably still awake. He had told her that he would hang out with some friends that he didn't have, but instead he had... done _this_. If it hadn't been for the cutter he had found in his pocket (after putting it in there himself), perhaps he... sighing, he narrowed his eyes. What did it even matter? What was done was done and he'd just have to deal with the consequences.

Just like he always did.

Originally, he had planned on simply waiting until his mother had fallen asleep and sneaking back into his room then, but Seifer would likely make him go home right now and perhaps even confront his mom. Maybe hanging out at his place for a little while wasn't such a bad idea after all.

Then again...

"What about _your_ parents?" he asked slowly.

Seifer merely smirked complacently.

"I live alone. There's no one at my place you'd have to be worried about except for my dog."

"... You have a dog?"

The blond frowned a bit at the incredulity in Squall's voice, but he was also perplexed by the sudden interest that the comment about his dog seemed to have elicited. Squall was chewing on the corner of his bottom lip, arms crossed tightly before his chest, but there was a bright spark of curiosity in his eyes that hadn't been there before.

"Yeah, I do," Seifer answered, then cocked his head aside suspiciously. "Don't tell me you're afraid of dogs now."

"... No. I'm not."

And to Seifer's great surprise, the brunette suddenly turned around and circled the truck, very slowly, until he'd made it to the passenger door. Then, he simply stood there, waiting for the blond to shut off the alarm and unlock the vehicle. Instinctively, after a moment spent in surprised stupor, Seifer complied with the brunette's mute order and hit the buttons of his remote control. Arching one eyebrow, he watched how Squall opened the door and wordlessly slid into his seat, not heeding the blond out on the sidewalk with a single look.

Sighing to himself, Seifer slowly shook his head.

"... You are one hell of a strange guy, Squall Leonhart. Just what am I gonna do with you...?"


	10. One Step Closer To

-:-**  
Chapter 10  
One Step Closer To…**

"_How oblivious could you possibly be?"  
_-:-

The inside of his car was much colder than Seifer had originally left it. The leather of his seat felt crisp against his bare arms, causing the hair on his skin to stand. They had been driving for a while now and he had cranked up the heater a long time ago, but even that didn't quite seem to help. The coldness was spreading within Seifer's body, seeping into his bones – not because of a chill in the air, but because of the traumatizing events that had unfolded before his eyes.

He looked over at the guy sitting to his right, but Squall's distant gaze was pinned to the black dashboard before him. His bandaged wrists were resting slack on top of his thighs, their stark white color contrasting noticeably against the dark blue of his jeans.

The brunette was so quiet.

Without saying a word, Seifer adjusted his view back to the road in front of him. Late night traffic was easing by as they progressed down the highway at moderate speed; the last thing that Seifer needed was a ticket for speeding _and_ driving under the influence.

He had enough to deal with for the night.

As he watched a motorcycle passing him to the left, he turned his head to Squall once more, a sudden realization stirring in his mind even beneath all his scattered thoughts.

"Hey... Squall," he started, his voice slightly disjointed and off pitch, "Did you leave your bike somewhere by the playground?"

Frankly, the thought hadn't even occurred to him until right then and there. Squall had obviously caught some sort of ride to the park, unless of course he actually _resided_ in the very expensive neighborhood that surrounded it. Considering the brunette's tremendous work load at "Ward's" however, Seifer thought that hardly possible.

"No," Squall finally replied monotonously, not moving his gaze from the dashboard by even an inch. "I didn't."

"Did you walk?" the blond continued with a curious kink of his eyebrow. "Uh, I mean, do you like, _live_ down in that area, or what?"

"... Yeah. I live there."

Seifer kept glancing back and forth between Squall's emotionless face and the illuminated highway, but the brunette seemed less than willing to elaborate on the subject of his home any further. He had veered his head aside slightly, now watching the dim lights of Deling City that were flittering all around them. His lips were little but a narrow, hard line, and Seifer thought that he saw Squall's fingers twitching on top of his legs.

The eighteen year old had been caught in many awkward situations in his life, but not once before had he felt so damn confused and helpless. Taking Squall home with him had seemed like a great idea at first, but how much good would it _really_ do? Granted, Seifer could properly clean and patch up his wounds, but he knew well enough that all the bandages in the world wouldn't fix Squall's real problems, whichever they might be. Seifer had never dealt with anyone suicidal before, nor had he ever bothered to spend much thought on the subject itself.

Now, everything was different.

He stared down the road in uncomfortable silence, mechanically shifting, braking and accelerating. He wanted to say something - to talk about Squall's injuries and ask about the reason for their existence - but he knew that he might as well try to strike a conversation with a rock. For the time being, he really couldn't do much of anything.

"... I'm sorry."

Seifer blinked and turned his head towards Squall. The brunette's voice had been flat and subdued, but those words of his had reached Seifer's ears all the same. Squall wasn't looking at him, only glaring out the window and curling his hands to tight fists that caused his knuckles to turn white.

"What?" Seifer asked, obviously puzzled by that unexpected apology. "What do you mean? Sorry? Sorry for what?"

He could see Squall's fine, dark brown brows shifting low over his eyes as the corners of his mouth were tightening. Then, the younger boy drew a shallow breath that was bordering to an exasperate sigh.

"Sorry for ruining your night."

Again, Seifer blinked in confusion and moved his left hand from the steering wheel to the top of his head, scratching it dumbly.

"Ruin my... huh?" he mumbled as he stared at Squall without the slightest hint of understanding dawning in his viridian eyes. "What the hell are you talkin' about?"

Squall crossed his arms before his chest, still vehemently refusing to heed the blond with so much as a curt glimpse. His eyes narrowed even further when he spoke again.

"I heard you on the playground," he explained, a strange, stretched tone to his voice that Seifer couldn't quite decipher. "... You and Rinoa."

"Ohh..." Seifer breathed, finally getting a grasp on Squall's clumsy idea of an explanation. "Right... Yeah, about that... Uh... Well... What can I say? I guess I'd rather spend the night with you than with her."

The blond smirked and shrugged carelessly, pretending that this statement carried little or no deeper meaning at all, but he gulped when Squall turned around to look at him for the very first time since they had gotten into the truck. Chocolate brown fringes of hair were cascading wryly into the seventeen year old's face as he finally allowed his dark grey eyes to collide with Seifer's green ones, searching them aimlessly. Confusion had meshed with the brunette's fine features, screwing them questioningly as he uncrossed his arms.

"What? Why?" Squall asked eventually, skepticism evident in his tone. "I don't get it."

Squall's open display of confusion was adorable, and his cuteness perhaps a little out of place in their current situation, but Seifer responded to it instinctively all the same. He gave a low, husky chuckle that would have caused any girl to blush, but Squall merely kept glaring at him with a persistence that was somewhat admirable.

"Oh? You don't, huh? And why's that?" Seifer cooed softly.

The question seemed to catch Squall slightly off guard. Another frown creased his brows as he whisked his head aside once more and continued to stare out of the window, but this time, he didn't remain silent for long.

"Because of what you said this morning," the dark haired boy started slowly, the words oddly hard and calm as he performed a vague gesture with his right hand. "And because of what _I _said. Because of... everything."

Seifer was genuinely surprised to hear the brunette bringing up that particular, uncomfortable incident. Frankly, he himself had practically forgotten all about it when faced with Squall's injuries; his concern for the boy had overwritten all his other, more bitter feelings with ease. Now, he remembered his nasty, hurtful words of their early morning encounter in the parking lot, and he also remembered how damn sorry he had been all day.

"That..." he murmured uneasily, now turning his head away as well, "I didn't really... _mean_ any of that. I was just running my mouth 'cause I was tired and pissed off."

He couldn't tell whether Squall was pleased with that response or not, because the brunette had apparently decided to resume ignoring him again. Perhaps it was better that way, the blond mused. Perhaps it meant that he was forgiven for his idiotic behavior, or that Squall was at least willing to forget it. In any case, he decided that he would refrain from intentionally hurting his younger classmate's feelings again – obviously, Squall's life was already complicated enough without anyone adding to his pile of problems for the mere sake of making him feel bad.

Neither of them spoke any more for the rest of the trip. Seifer guided them through the scarce traffic and his posh suburban neighborhood, until he finally pulled into his parking lot and the one spot that the apartment complex had assigned to him. When they came to a complete stand still and Seifer turned off the engine of his truck, the sudden silence that enveloped them like a thick, impenetrable cloak was strangely overwhelming. Next to the blond, Squall wasn't moving so much as a single muscle, and his breathing was hardly audible as he skeptically gazed through the windows up the tall, snobbish looking apartment buildings.

"Well, this is it," Seifer explained unnecessarily as he unbuckled his seat belt. "Let's get out."

He opened his door and leaped on the ground, glad to see that Squall was soon following his example. The brunette still refused to look at him; he stood next to the truck, his hands slack at his sides and his eyes fixed upon the stucco façade of the building in front of them. As Seifer stepped up to him, he could see a sort of fierce determination kindling with the indifference in Squall's pale face.

"So... this is where I live," Seifer stated. "Me and my crazy ass dog, that is."

Squall gave something like a very low-pitched grunt, but said nothing further. He was frowning, as usual, but Seifer had already gotten used to that sight. Taking a deep breath, he hit the remote control button that locked his truck and slowly stepped around Squall's rigid figure.

"Let's go," he suggested, glancing at the brunette from over his shoulder. "I live on the second floor, so we gotta take the stairs. You think you can make it?"

Snorting, Squall shifted his weight onto his right foot and clasped his arms before his chest. Seifer resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the brunette's childish display of pride and merely nodded curtly as he took the first few steps forward.

"Fair enough. Follow me."

He walked slowly until Squall had finally caught up with him, the sound of their now synchronous footsteps swallowed by the concrete beneath the soles of their boots. It was quiet around them; so quiet that Seifer thought that he could hear Squall's flaring panic. He was almost certain that the brunette would try and make a break for it, but to his mild surprise, Squall did neither stop short nor make an attempt at running away.

When they reached the flight of stairs that led up to Seifer's small but expensive apartment, the blond turned to his classmate once more.

"Up here," he said, jabbing his thumb upwards. "As you see, these things are kinda steep. Sucks carrying your groceries up there, too, 'specially when it's raining. Not sure exactly what those assholes were thinking when they built this."

He was rambling and he knew it, too. Squall stood next to him, shivering only marginally against the cold wind that was whipping through the open stairway. Frankly, Seifer had no clue why all stairs and apartment entrances were located outside, leaving the renters at the mercy of the weather.

What were his parents paying those fifteen hundred bucks a month for again?

'_Ah... Doesn't fuckin' matter. Not right now, anyway. I just gotta get him up there somehow without him keeling over on the way.'_

Smiling suggestively, Seifer took a mock bow and motioned Squall to go ahead.

"After you," he drawled.

The brunette regarded him with a cool, narrow-eyed look, but eventually complied with Seifer's awkward invitation. For a split second, he wondered whether the blond had wanted to walk behind him because he was worried that Squall would fall, but the seventeen year old pushed the thought aside almost hastily. He didn't care about Seifer's reasons, nor did he believe that they were of any noteworthy importance. If they _were_, he would have no idea whatsoever how to cope. Ignoring the possibility that maybe, just maybe, Seifer _did_ truly care for him seemed like the easiest thing to do for the time being.

Shaking all questions out of his mind, Squall slowly ascended the staircase. Seifer was walking right behind him; he was so close that Squall could hear him breathing even through the soft howl of the night breeze, and the sound caused his heart to jump out of pace and his thoughts to go haywire once more.

'_What am I doing here? What was I thinking? I don't even **know** him. I don't **want** to know him. It's none of his business what I do with my wrists or any other damn part of my body. I shouldn't have followed him. I'm such an idiot. Why is he trying to help me, anyway...? Why is he walking so close? Why is he... ugh. Whatever. It doesn't matter why he's doing what he's doing. I don't care. I don't need his pity. I just want him to leave me alone. I can take care of myself just fine. I don't need anyone. I'm not... I'm... I... Shit... I don't know. I don't know why I'm here. I don't know anything at all. This is bad. I should leave...'_

When Squall abruptly stopped in his stride, his head low and his eyes fixed upon the stairs to his feet as his feelings threatened to overwhelm him, Seifer only barely managed to avoid a collision. Grunting, he stepped to the side and scooted around the brunette's motionless frame, studying Squall's blank face very attentively.

"Damn, get some brake lights installed or something if ya plan on stopping like that," he mumbled impatiently, before tilting his head in question. "What's up? Huh?"

Squall avoided his gaze very carefully, but before Seifer had a chance to ask any further questions or haul the brunette up the stairs by brute force, the enigmatic boy in front of him quickly shook his head.

"... Nothing."

With his eyes still on the ground, Squall circled Seifer's figure and stoically continued walking. To hell with his useless fear and childish panic; he could do this. He wasn't afraid. He had been through much worse times than these in his life. Seifer could do nothing to him that others hadn't already done before him...

He had nothing left to lose.

"There we go. To your left!"

Squall glanced at the carefully stained, solid wood door at the end of a small corridor that, apparently, seemed to lead to Seifer's apartment. Cautiously, he approached the entrance as he heard the blond behind him fiddling with his key chain.

"Alright, now listen up," Seifer said sternly as he pushed past his brunette classmate, fixing Squall with a gaze that demanded attention. "My fuckin' dog, Shiva, can be kinda rowdy, and she ain't small, either, so... uh, if you want, I can lock her up in the bathroom before you come in."

To Seifer's astonishment, Squall merely acknowledged his statement by drawing his eyebrows together and giving a cynical snort.

"I'm not scared, alright?" he spat abjectly as he stepped up to the door, demonstratively waiting for the blond to go ahead and unlock it already.

"... So I see," Seifer whistled quietly, unable to suppress a hint of concern over Squall's boldness.

Seifer's canine companion was a three year old Alaskan malamute; beautiful to boot, but also no less powerful and headstrong. Usually, she would issue extremely vocal greetings whenever she heard him coming home, but on this particular night she was being awfully quiet. Seifer guessed that she was probably asleep, but his assumption was immediately proven incorrect when he finally unlocked and opened his front door.

There she was, all snow white and coal black fur and piercing blue eyes, waiting in the doorway like a perfect statue. Only her tail was wagging slowly as she displayed untypical calmness and looked both boys over with wisdom that seemed much too alien for a dog.

"Hey girl," Seifer greeted her with a friendly smirk as he bent down to scratch her pointy ears. "Guess what... I brought a visitor."

He took a step aside to make room for Squall, close the door behind them and turn on the lights. They had walked right into his slightly unruly living room, but apparently, Seifer's guest seemed to care little about the blond's tidiness, or rather the lack thereof. With his golden brows arching in incredulity as he turned back around, Seifer found Squall already down on one knee before Shiva, receiving sloppy wet "kisses" from the dog that normally refused to socialize with strangers. As a matter of fact, Shiva had chased away a good number of Seifer's female and male visitors alike, consequently ruining more than just one of the blond's prospective one-night stands. Obviously, this was something that the blond had never been quite happy about.

Strangely enough, Shiva seemed to have no objections against Seifer's most recent acquaintance.

Shiva, however, wasn't the only one acting strangely. Squall was still kneeling in front of her, stroking her fur in a very calm and experienced manner, and for the very first time, Seifer thought that he could see a small smile playing at the corners of the brunette's lips.

"Damn," Seifer whistled in acknowledgement, jingling his keys as he approached the astonishing scene, "I didn't think you two would hit it off like that. She usually bonds with people by tearing off their pants, you know."

Now definitely smiling, Squall was massaging the back of Shiva's nose, and he chuckled softly as she begun to wag her tail in boundless canine delight.

"She's a good dog," the brunette replied quietly, flashing another quick grin at the malamute. "She's beautiful."

Squall was completely unaware of the effect that the sudden change in his facial expression had on Seifer. The older teen was towering next to him, staring mutely and with a pounding pulse at the two gorgeous creatures to his feet. He just couldn't believe that Squall was actually _smiling_ – the mere concept had seemed practically impossible up until that very moment when Shiva had unceremoniously stuck her wet, smelly nose into the handsome brunette's face.

"Holy shit, you're smiling," Seifer declared, his voice coarse with amazement. "I don't think I've ever seen you smile before."

Squall attempted to wipe the grin off his face and keep a blush from creeping to his high cheekbones, but he couldn't quite manage. Forcing the dark frown back onto his features as best as he could, he tried very hard to sound abrasive.

"Whatever."

He continued to stroke Shiva and Seifer watched him, truly mesmerized by the other boy's simple display of affection, until a flash of white around the rim of Squall's sleeve reminded him painfully of why he had brought the brunette home with him in the first place.

'_Well, fuck. I__ guess it can't be helped.'_

Clearing his throat noisily, he slowly approached Squall's crouching figure.

"Hey... Squall."

The dark haired boy turned his head aside and gave him a long, watchful look, immediately alerted by the serious tone that had stolen itself into Seifer's strong voice. The tall blond was gazing back at him for a moment, viridian green orbs issuing a mute apology.

"I need to look at your wounds," Seifer finally explained, inaudibly sighing at the icy spark that flared up in Squall's eyes. "Trust me, I could watch you two rolling around on the floor all night, but unfortunately that won't fix your injuries. C'mon, I promise it won't take long."

Equally confused and embarrassed by Seifer's declared interest in watching him cuddle with his dog, Squall quickly shot to his feet. His head spun nastily in protest against the abrupt movement, but he ignored it with coldly exercised familiarity. The older blond was looking him over with an expression that suggested concern, but eventually, Seifer merely nodded and pointed to a spot behind Squall.

"Over there, in my bedroom."

He ushered the reluctant brunette through his living room, past the couch that was buried underneath untouched bags of clothes from his trip to the mall. Seifer possessed few, expensive pieces of furniture, which - just like the rest of his apartment - he never bothered to keep clean; after all, he had someone come in twice a week to straighten up in his stead. He knew he was lazy, but when he saw Squall raising his eyebrows in quiet disapproval, he actually regretted that fact for the very first time in his life.

"Sorry 'bout the mess," he apologized with a muffled grunt, somewhat relieved that he had at least bothered to make his bed before he had taken off for the club that evening.

Frankly, he _had_ planned on taking Rinoa home with him for some easy, distracting fun, but things had somehow turned out much differently than he had originally anticipated. And though he didn't much _like_ the reason for Squall's late night visit, he was all the more excited to have the _true_ object of his interest over at his house this evening.

_Late at night._

_Alone_.

Quickly shaking his head against the heat rising in all the wrong places of his body, he tried to stay focused.

'_Man, pull yourself the fuck together! You've got more important things to worry about right now, dumbass. Like pretty boy almost bleeding dry on a playground, for instance. Really, you'd better get a grip right fuckin' now.'_

Of course, such things were always much easier said than done.

"Uh, have a seat," he ordered awkwardly as he closed the door behind them and picked some clothes off the floor on his way, carelessly tossing them into his laundry basket.

The brunette seemed hesitant at the concept of sitting down on Seifer's king sized bed, because his facial expression was accordingly insecure. He stared down at the mattress as if he fully expected it to bite, wrestling deeply ingrained fears that Seifer knew nothing about.

"Uh, Squall? You wanna sit down, or what?"

Banishing the little voice that urged him to run away into the deep back of his mind, Squall edgily lowered himself onto the bed. Beneath him, black satin sheets were rustling softly; it was a sound that reminded him of his childhood – of a past that he both loathed and longed for desperately. Images of his mother holding him tight and looking upon him with loving, but sad cobalt blue eyes flashed before him, and he could feel his skin breaking into goose bumps as the memories resurfaced.

"Squall? Hey. Squall!"

Frowning, Seifer watched how the petrified brunette's eyes snapped back into focus as he called out his name. Squall seemed confused, shocked almost, as if he had just realized where he was at. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, his feet planted firmly on the floor and his hands wrenched into the sheets as his gaze darted around the room aimlessly.

A deer in the headlights if Seifer had ever seen one.

'_What is it with him? He totally spaced out on me just now. For fuck's sake, it's just a bed; don't tell me he's scared of furniture now.'_

Sighing placidly, Seifer walked up to the dark haired boy, who seemed to be staring a hole into the wall before him, and slowly went down upon his knees. Naturally, that gesture managed to snare Squall's undivided attention in the matter of a heartbeat. The brunette adjusted his disjointed gaze to the blond squatting by his feet, and the sight caused his eyebrows to arch towards his hairline, while his skin acquired a rather lovely shade of red.

"W-what the hell are you doing...?" Squall stammered uneasily, a flustered edge to his voice. "Why-"

"Lemme see your wrists."

Squall watched Seifer moving closer to him, his pale face wiped clean of expression. The blond across from him wasn't smiling, though his eyes looked kind. Still, he was too close; Squall's knees had involuntarily come in contact with Seifer's chest, and when the older teen reached for his hands, Squall instinctively wanted to yank them back.

"Hold still," Seifer ordered in a low, semi-growling voice as he took a firm hold of Squall's left wrist.

The brunette squirmed at the touch, too proud to back away completely and yet too frightened to simply endure the bodily contact. He was glaring at the other guy fiercely while trying to control his rapid breathing, but even for all his iciness and all his false bravado, Seifer knew that he was scared. The hand that he was cupping in his own larger one was trembling noticeably, and the blond flicked up his gaze to study Squall's stark white face.

"Squall? What are you scared of?" he asked, the calmness of his tone taking the initial insult out of the question.

Squall scowled at him all the same.

"Nothing," he hissed as his eyes flared with anger.

"... Right."

Silently, Seifer commenced to unwrap the first bandage. It had been stained crimson, but he let the dirtied gauze fabric coil to the bedroom floor all the same; his _carpet_ was really the last thing that he was concerned about.

Squall's skin looked worse in the light of his room than it had in the darkness of the playground. The brunette's left wrist had been slit multiple times over, and the horizontal lines that lacerated his flesh ran fairly deep. Despite the drying patches of blood, Seifer also discovered older, similar looking cuts which had turned into whitish scars that had already faded into the porcelain color of Squall's skin.

They proved Seifer's assumptions of Squall's cutting habits only too correct.

The blond's emerald eyes narrowed in disapproval, but he said nothing; now wasn't the right time for lectures. Squall was uncomfortable enough as it was, all skittish looking like a little kid who had done something wrong. The blond decided that he could always give Squall a piece of his mind later.

Not that he had any real idea of what to say.

Quietly, he went to unwrap Squall's other wrist as well. The brunette was still staring at some imaginary point to the left of them, his brows knitted low over his eyes and his lips pressed together firmly. He looked angry, embarrassed, proud and scared – all at the very same time. Seifer didn't quite know how to help the brunette relax; he really had no experience with these kinds of things.

"Okay," he murmured as both of the dark haired teen's wrists were uncovered and resting on his thighs. "I'm gonna wash my hands and grab some stuff from the bathroom. Be right back."

Squall turned his head to glance down at his wounds, but he remained silent.

"And don't you dare move, got it?" Seifer ordered sternly as he disappeared into the bathroom.

After the blond had washed his hands thoroughly with antibacterial soap, he randomly pulled some bottles, bandages and sterile pads out of his medicine cabinet. He figured it best to take some wet washcloths and dry towels as well, and with utmost care he managed to carry everything back into the bedroom.

Squall was eyeing him full of mistrust and suspicion; dark, choppy strands of hair obscured a good portion of his face as he quickly lowered his head out of sight, but Seifer knew well enough that he was scowling.

"Hey, man, what's with the frown," the blond tried to joke as he knelt down before Squall and dropped his supplies onto the bed, "I mean, c'mon, you've got Doc Almasy taking care of ya! You'd better feel honored here. I wouldn't do this for just anyone, you know."

The brunette's gaze was cold and humorless behind coal black lashes, unmoved by Seifer's kindness, but there was also a trace of insecurity there that he couldn't fully conceal. Squall had never allowed anyone to find out about his cut up wrists, let alone have them tend to his wounds, so this was entirely new territory for him. There was only one other person who knew of this self-destructive habit of his... probably the most unlikely individual imaginable. That one particular person cared little about the brunette's agony, but Squall had to admit that Seifer was, perhaps, different; at least he had neither mocked him nor called him pathetic.

Squall almost drowned in the maze of his thoughts, but a sudden sting of pain abruptly hurled him back into reality. Hissing a random curse, he glared down at Seifer and the light blue washcloth he was using to clean his wounds. The blond considered him with a small, lopsided smirk.

"Sorry," the older boy murmured, feigning contriteness.

Judging by the blond youth's content grin, however, Squall had all reason to assume that Seifer had actually hurt him on purpose. And indeed - annoyed and concerned over the fact that Squall had once again clammed up on him, Seifer had found startling the brunette a very acceptable means of shaking him out of his stupor.

Sighing irritably, Squall decided to pay better attention to what exactly it was that the other boy was doing to him. Shoving the hair out of his face with the one hand that Seifer wasn't doctoring with, he studied each of the blond's movements with great vigilance.

Admittedly, Seifer threw him off by being so meticulous and gentle. It seemed unusual, especially when taking into consideration that Squall had initially mistaken Seifer for just another useless, cocky football jock with a giant brick for a brain. Apparently, however, there was more to the brawny blond than his superficial arrogance and his stupid varsity jacket suggested. He was cleaning Squall's wounds with great care and without even the slightest hint of repulsion showing on his handsome features.

Ah, and handsome he certainly was, even Squall had to give him that. No wonder all the girls in school were running their mouths about Seifer Almasy during class and flocking to him left and right during breaks. The brunette could hardly blame them; had he been a girl himself, he figured that he would've probably done the same thing.

Biting down upon the inside of his cheek, Squall quickly pitched his head into his neck and nailed his gaze to the chalk white ceiling, if only to prevent another blush from crossing his tense features. He wasn't sure why on earth he was having thoughts of such ridiculous, pubescent nature, but he definitely didn't want Seifer to find out.

"What do you usually put on them?"

Startled once more, Squall blinked down at the blond before him. Seifer was looking back at him expectantly from between his knees, one hand fastened around his hip as he was squatting there on the floor.

Squall couldn't help but swallow at the sight.

'_Why does he have to be down **there** of all places? This is weird. He shouldn't be sitting between my legs and I shouldn't have let him in the first place. And why the hell is he looking at me like that?'_

"... W-What?" Squall stammered, taken aback by the amused glint that lit up the blond's emerald green eyes.

"Your wrists," Seifer explained willingly. "What kinda stuff do you usually put on them to keep 'em from getting infected? 'Cause this obviously isn't the first time you've butchered them like that."

With a fresh frown littering his pretty face, Squall first glared at Seifer, then at his wounds that were looking so much cleaner now.

"... Peroxide," he replied sullenly.

"_Peroxide_?" Seifer spat with a surprised hiss. "You put _peroxide_ on those? What are you, _nuts_?"

Squall's face soured even further at the blond's outrage.

"You asked."

"Yeah, but... fuck, kiddo. Peroxide of all things? Why don't you go sprinkle some salt and Tabasco sauce on them and have yourself a _real_ sting fest? I mean, might as well go all out."

"Whatever."

Grunting, Seifer grabbed one of the bottles that he had brought from the bathroom and shoved it right into Squall's dumbfounded face. The brunette tried to back away from the object, but the older teen was still holding on to one of his arms, and he was clearly disinclined to let go.

"There," Seifer drawled as he swung the bottle back and forth provocatively, "No-sting Bactine. I know it 'prolly won't satisfy that masochistic side of yours, but it's all I've got. So hold the fuck still!"

Still bristling against the other male's touch, Squall watched reluctantly how Seifer swiped his wrists with sterile pads drenched in Bactine. Indeed, it hardly hurt at all, or at least the pain was marginal compared to that of a treatment with peroxide. Not that it mattered even the slightest bit at all – Squall wasn't afraid of pain. He wasn't afraid of _anything, _for that matter – or shouldn't have been, anyway.

And yet...

Why was his heart pounding at a million miles inside his chest right now?

"How's that?" Seifer asked, his green eyes boring like flames into Squall's unreadable grey ones.

The brunette swallowed again and ground his teeth together.

He hated it when Seifer looked at him like that – so very intently, like he was the only person worth looking at in this world; it made his breath hitch and his pulse race, and some unscarred part of his mind believe things that could impossibly be real.

"... Whatever," he replied reluctantly and curled his hands to fists.

"I said, hold _still_," Seifer growled in exasperation as he wrenched Squall's fingers apart. "And seriously, as smart as you are and all, you really need work on your vocabulary."

"Whatev—"

"Yeah, yeah, never mind," the blond groaned, rolling his eyes in annoyance. "I fuckin' got it."

Shaking his head, Seifer fished for the bandages he had placed on the bed. Squall was watching him full of suspicion, though he pretended that he didn't give so much as a rat's ass about what the other teen was doing to him. Seifer was peeling the plastic wrapper off one bandage noisily, before he carefully begun to wind it around Squall's left wrist, which he had covered with a sterile 4x4 gauze pad.

Seifer worked silently, focused almost entirely onto his task. Deep down, he couldn't thank his parents enough for forcing him to learn first aid and providing him with all the necessary and superfluous medical equipment he could possibly ever need.

One of these days, he'd probably have to call them and actually voice his gratitude.

_'Hah. Yeah, right. I'll get right on that.'_

Sighing, he continued to devote his attention to Squall's wounds. While he was working, however, he couldn't quite forget about his and and the brunette's volatile early morning encounter; as he enveloped the dark haired boy's horrible looking wrists, he got a painful feeling that he was at least partly to blame for this.

"Uh," he cleared his throat as he secured the first bandage with a clip and gave Squall a weak half-smirk. "So, uhm... About this morning, you know... uh, in the parking lot. Uh... Look, I know I may not be the nicest or most considerate guy out there or nothin', but... I really _am _sorry for what I said to you. I know I was a total dick. I didn't mean any of it, I promise. That was just my big mouth talking. So... yeah... I'm sorry, Squall. I really am."

He dropped his gaze immediately, not waiting for an answer from Squall that he was probably never going to receive, anyway. The brunette, however, was thoughtfully glancing back and forth between his own, throbbing wrists and Seifer's upset face from beneath dark, half-lidded eyes, and before his defense mechanisms could have kicked in, he quietly raised his voice.

"... You're nicer than most," he breathed, the words hushed.

"Huh? You really think so?" the blond replied in surprise, before he begun to wrap Squall's other wrist and smiled very vaguely. "I guess that's only with you, though."

He could hear Squall sucking in a breath. Apparently, the brunette had not expected to receive an answer of such... _intimate _nature, and this time his curiosity got the better of him.

"... What? What are you talking about?" the brunette asked.

Again, Seifer gave him a sly and indistinct grin. The blond knew that he was probably going too far, but he figured that this really wasn't the time to be dishonest.

Still, by now, he'd learned to be more careful.

"You know... you're kinda cute when you're confused," he chuckled, but he didn't meet Squall's eye.

"What kind of answer is _that?_" the other teen snapped, the annoyed tone of his voice erecting yet another snort of laughter from Seifer's end. "... What are you laughing at?"

"You?" the blond lilted with just a hint of sarcasm.

Squall growled irritably in response to the older male's teasing, and his face became sour.

The boy squatting by his feet merely smirked, before he decided to elaborate.

"I'm laughing 'cause you, of _all _people, really have no right whatsoever to complain about getting vague or non-existent answers."

"... Whatever."

Seifer laughed quietly once more, but this time, he said nothing. Squall was glaring at him furiously; obviously, he was a lot more curious than he'd normally let on. The dark haired youth seemed frustrated at the concept of being played with, and though Seifer believed that he thoroughly deserved to be at the _receiving_ end of such a treatment for a change, he was also softening at the sight of a very helpless, defeated looking brunette.

"Look, this is the deal," Seifer drawled smugly, fully aware of the other boy's undivided attention, "... I lied when I said everyone was sick of you."

The dark haired teen slowly laced his eyebrows together at that remark, and the corners of his mouth curved downwards.

"No," he stated demurely, struggling to sound cynical and careless. "You were absolutely right."

"Well, actually-"

"And I don't give a fuck, either," Squall cut the blond off icily.

Seifer, natually, couldn't help but chortle in amusement. Who was Squall trying to fool? Granted, the brunette probably cared less about his environment than the average high school student did, but Seifer knew that he also wasn't nearly as callous and cold-hearted as he portrayed himself to be. He _had_ seen emotions crossing those plains of storm blue – hurt, anxiety, anger, fear, helplessness – each of which had belied Squall's typical display of indifference.

"Oh, is that so, huh?" Seifer mocked the brunette's defiance cunningly. "Well, here's a newsflash for ya, princess: _I _am not sick of you."

He could almost watch Squall's hastily slammed up walls collapsing right in front of him in genuine surprise over those words.

"W-What?" the dark haired boy stuttered. "Why...?"

"Why?" Seifer repeated the question, while breathing another low-pitched chuckle. "Come on, now. How oblivious could you possibly be?"

It had been a daring thing to say, of course, but Squall didn't seem to catch on to the blond's insinuation. Seifer hadn't really expected anything else, but when he saw Squall's gaze growing distant and out of focus, he did wonder.

How oblivious _could _Squall be?

Perhaps he had dropped just a few too many hints; did he _really_ want the brunette to find out about his feelings? It probably wasn't the most reasonable idea that had ever crossed his mind, but then again, when had Seifer ever been reasonable in the first place? He liked Squall beyond any ordinary bond of platonic friendship, and by all means, he couldn't help that - or at least he didn't want to. He wasn't sure how receptive the younger boy would be towards any kind of offensive approach, but he would try and blaze a trail for it all the same.

In the end, he figured that he didn't have much to lose, anyway.

Calmly, he continued to wrap the brunette's wrist. He studied the pale limb in his own, tanned hands, suddenly recalling the leather band that usually embraced it.

"So, tell me... Do you wear any bandages underneath those wristbands you're usually running around with?" he asked, if only to breach the silence between them.

"No."

"Fuck," Seifer growled, grimacing. "Doesn't that hurt?"

"No."

"Liar."

He wondered why on earth the brunette was pretending to be so goddamn tough. His wounds looked painful, even to Seifer, who wasn't a pansy by any stretch of the imagination. Why was Squall cutting himself, anyway? Hadn't his parents noticed anything yet? Somebody aside from him _had _to have realized that Squall was bagging some serious issues. What _reason_ did he have to be all self-destructive like that? He was a good-looking guy, and smart to boot, too. Just what was going on in his life that made him feel so desperate?

Yet again, Seifer was faced with way too many questions and not near enough answers.

"... Why are you doing this?"

Seifer's head pitched back in surprise at Squall's harsh, but unsure words. The brunette was glaring at him challengingly and his legs in the dark blue jeans were shifting, trying to keep Seifer at a distance.

"Doing what?" Seifer asked, arching his brows.

Growling, Squall lifted the wrist that Seifer was working on from the blond's hands and jerked it demonstratively.

"_This._"

The older teen merely shrugged in response and quickly reclaimed Squall's limb.

"To stop it from bleeding?" he replied simply.

To his astonishment, Squall gave a sharp hiss and his eyes narrowed ominously.

"That's not what I meant," the brunette snapped and tried to cross his arms before his chest, but Seifer held on to them tightly.

"Will you hold the _fuck _still already?" the older youth barked irritably as he wrestled Squall for his wrists. "Stubborn lil' prick."

When he realized that he couldn't possibly talk Squall into place, nor force him to stay put without risking to break his forearms in the process, Seifer finally heaved a guttural, exasperate sigh and decided to just give the brunette this one.

"Were you even listening to anything I said?" he groaned, while heeding Squall with a serious, still look out of spellbinding green eyes. "I _care_ about you, dumbass."

Squall tried to edge back slowly, but Seifer was still holding on to him with a firm grasp.

"I don't get it," the brunette bristled, mashing his eyebrows together in an expression of disbelief. "Why? I haven't exactly been nice to you. So _why_?"

"Why? Good question, really. I could ask you the same thing," Seifer stated neutrally. "_Why _is it you're trying to kill yourself?"

It was another one of the questions that Squall definitely didn't seem inclined to answer. Nonetheless, he bit down upon his lower lip and trained his gaze past Seifer upon one of the far walls, as if trying to stare it to pieces.

"... I'm not."

"You're not?" Seifer grunted, skepticism evident in each syllable. "Then just why the fuck are you butchering your wrists if not for _that_, huh?"

Squall flicked his dark grey gaze back to him defiantly.

"Maybe I like pain," he snarled, his tone almost arrogant.

Seifer couldn't keep from cackling with humorless laughter. He figured that this skinny little punk was probably into _something_, but pain sure the hell wasn't it. Every part of Squall seemed to deteriorate under the burden of whatever secret it was that was weighing on his shoulders, and he had been in blatant _tears_ at the playground – it certainly wasn't the kind of reaction Seifer would have ever expected from a true masochist.

"Yeah fuckin' right," he sneered. "You look like you're into pain about as much as I am into screwing three legged goats."

Ever so slowly, Squall kinked one of his brows as his gaze searched Seifer's face with openly displayed curiosity.

Three legged goats...?

"_Hey_," Seifer barked in half mock, half serious tone, "_Don't _look at me like that, alright! I'm not into fucking goats! Jesus. Aren't you ever the lil sodomist pervert, huh?"

Despite the initial seriousness of the situation, Squall found himself smiling weakly. He didn't know why, but this ornery blond definitely had a way of making him forget about his problems by cracking silly jokes or picking on him like only a little kid would. He still didn't understand why Seifer was so eager to help him, but the concept bothered him less and less by the minute.

Quietly, he lowered his head to watch Seifer attaching a small, metal clip to the bandage on his right wrist to keep it in place. After inspecting his work and nodding to himself in mute approval, the tall blond teen stood up and stretched out his aching knees. The younger brunette was still studying him from his hunched over position on the bed, though he tried his very best to conceal his subtle interest.

Thoughtfully, Seifer looked down upon him. Squall's forearms were resting on his thighs as the brunette slowly pulled down his sleeves to cover up his injuries. Despite the fact that the fabric of his shirt was black, Seifer noticed the dried specks of blood that littered it. Part of him wondered how many shirts Squall had dirtied like that, and when the hell it would finally _stop_.

Squall shifted uneasily under Seifer's calm, strangely infuriating look. Absent-mindedly, he brushed a few, stray wisps of hair behind his ear and begun to scratch his left elbow.

"... Thanks," he huffed reluctantly, avoiding the blond's face with the stubbornness of a mule.

"Welcome."

Staring at the stretch of tan colored carpet before his feet, Squall tried to gulp down the uncomfortable lump in his throat. He didn't really know what to say or do, but he couldn't allow Seifer to keep piercing him with those intoxicatingly green eyes, either.

Somehow, those eyes made him feel like nothing else before ever had.

"I... I should get going," the brunette finally murmured, his voice hoarse.

Before he could have pushed himself off the bed, however, he already felt Seifer's hand on his shoulder, rooting him to the spot with the steadiness of a metric ton of rocks.

"Hey, now wait a sec," the blond interrupted his flight brusquely, sounding annoyed. "What do you mean, 'get going', huh? You're spending the night, idiot."

When Squall's head shot up, Seifer could practically see the resentment flaring up in his blue grey eyes. Really, had he ever expected anything else? The idea of spending the night at someone else's place probably sounded as enticing to the jumpy brunette as rolling around in a heap of razor blades.

Then again...

He _was_ Squall, after all. Razors seemed to scare him less than one would initially anticipate.

"What?" the dark haired teen snapped impulsively, every fiber of his body bristling against Seifer's statement with vehemence before he finally managed to steady his voice. "No! No, I'm not."

"You're not? Uhm, sorry to be the one to break this to ya, Squall, but it looks like you've got little choice in the matter."

"I don't care," Squall bit back testily. "I can't."

"You can't? Why not?" Seifer asked sarcastically, folding his arms before his chest. "Forgot your jammies or what?"

"Because of my _mom_," the brunette countered, his voice pure and unyielding like steel. "She doesn't know that I'm here. She'd worry herself sick if I just stayed over at someone else's place."

To Squall's surprise, Seifer wordlessly turned his back on him and opened the door to leave the room. The brunette's features writhed into a mask of confusion at the unexpected act, but before long, Seifer returned with a cordless phone in his hand.

"Here," the blond said complacently, thrusting out his hand and dropping the phone in Squall's lap with an unreadable grin. "Suit yourself."

Dumbfounded, Squall blinked at the sleek black object resting on his thighs. When he made no visual attempt at grasping it, Seifer heaved an impatient sigh and rolled his eyes towards the ceiling.

"It's called a _phone_," he snarled as he angled himself down to Squall and gave him a hearty poke in the chest. "Use it!"

"But-"

"I doubt your mom will have any objections against you staying over at a classmate's place. It's not like I'm a wicked chainsaw murderer or some shit like that. Gimme _some_ credit here!"

Screwing his pretty features into a nasty grimace, Squall crossed his arms defensively.

"I said I _can't_. What part of that doesn't go into your fucking head?"

"Right, you can't," Seifer cooed, sneering softly. "So, you're telling me you wanna go home looking like this - bandaged wrists, bloody shirt and everything? Oh, and just to let ya know... I have a pretty loose mouth, especially around mothers."

Looking outraged, Squall spat, "W-What the... You... Ugh. No, I _don't_ want to, okay, but-"

"That settles it, then. 'Cause I ain't letting you sleep in the damned park, so you might as well forget about that right fuckin' now! Get over it already – you ain't going anywhere tonight. You live too far away to be walking, anyway, and I'm not driving you. Sorry, but you're shit out of luck tonight, princess. Pull your big girl panties up and deal with it."

It might have been a cruel thing to say, and judging by Squall's upset scowl it probably had been, but Seifer had no intentions whatsoever to go so far as to actually _help_ the brunette in getting away. Frankly, he rather enjoyed Squall's frosty presence, and the concept of having him sleep over sounded enticing in more ways than just one.

Opposite of him, Squall remained silent for a long time. Seifer could tell that he was stewing up a storm, but that he also realized how essentially correct the eighteen year old's words had been; Squall _couldn't_ get back home without Seifer's help, or at least not without having to go through greater trouble than the thought of spending the night at the blond's place suggested.

Really, after taking everything into careful consideration, it was kind of pointless to resist.

Just this one time he would do exactly what Seifer had ordered him to do – suck it up and get this over with as quickly as humanly possible. And all in all, Seifer _had_ treated him pretty well, though that still didn't mean that Squall was interested in "bonding" with the blond in any way whatsoever. He was staying for the sake of necessity – nothing more, nothing less.

Or so he tried to make himself believe, anyway.

'_... Whatever. I'm not interested in him or anything that has to do with him. I don't even **like** him. I **don't**, alright? He's a dumb, annoying fuck. I'm staying 'cause I don't have a choice. That's all there is to it.'_

With a frigid and somewhat defeated looking expression, Squall finally picked up the phone and quickly dialed a set of numbers that Seifer wasn't quite fortunate enough to catch. When the brunette raised the handset to his ear, Seifer plopped down on the bed next to him nonchalantly. The gesture only put him at the receiving end of yet another frosty glare, but Seifer simply shrugged it off with a charming smirk.

So far, this really wasn't going all too badly.

"... Mom?"

Seifer's ears perked up; apparently, someone had picked up at the other end of the line.

"Yeah, it's me," the brunette said calmly, trying to sound casual. "I know. - I'm sorry. Did I wake you up? - No. Not anymore. I'm at a... friend's house."

Blinking, Seifer glanced at Squall's finely featured profile. Had the untouchable ice princess really just called him a "friend"?

_A friend?_

'_Be still my beating heart! Uh... wait, maybe I should have checked his temperature. He's 'prolly coming down with a fever. After all, he looks like he wants to hurl the damn phone at me. Don't think "friends" generally do that sorta thing.'_

Nonetheless, Seifer couldn't keep a content grin off his face.

"No. - No, his name's Seifer. Seifer Almasy. - No, you haven't. He just moved here from Balamb. - Yeah. Right. - No, I don't know. - Yeah. Hey, I'm going to spend the night at his place... is that alright? - Up north, off of Centennial. He gave me a ride. It's late, so I figured I'd just spend the night. - Yeah. It is. - Yeah. - Okay. - ... What? When? Tomorrow morning? But why... - No... - No, that's not it, I just... - Alright. Whatever. -Yeah, I will. - No, don't worry, Mom. - Okay, I'll see you tomorrow. Bye."

When Squall thumbed the "end call" button, the room was plunged into silence once more. Thoughts and concerns were racing through Squall's head at nauseating speed, whereas his blond companion's mind was quite fashionably blank - well, blank except for a nice dose of "Fuck yeah! Am I a _genius_ or what? I am the motherfucking _man_!"

Squall, however, seemed completely unaware of his host's bliss over the way the night was turning out.

Frankly, he had more important things on his mind.

'_... Great. What now? This was a stupid idea. What the hell was I thinking? I should have just caught a cab or something. Why did I agree to this? What's wrong with me? This is ridiculous. I don't want to sleep here... with **him** of all people! Fuck. Then again... I guess it might be better... than...'_

Quickly, the brunette shook that dangerous thought out of his head.

'_Fuck it. Let's just get this over with.'_

Sighing, Squall decided to give his wobbly legs a fair try as he slowly pushed himself off the bed. Before he had any chance at taking so much as two steps, however, Seifer had already leaped onto his feet and halted him by the shoulder. Squall responded to the intrusive gesture with an irritated half-glance, and he fastened one hand around his hip.

"Where do you think you're going?" Seifer asked evenly, ignoring the passive-aggressive vibes Squall was sending his way.

Wordlessly, the brunette raised his hand that was clutching the phone, but Seifer shook his head at him in disapproval.

"Nah, you stay here, alright? I'll take care of that. Not like you have any idea where to put it, anyway."

Snorting, Squall whisked around and thrust out his arm, motioning Seifer to take the phone from him. The blond did exactly so, while fixing Squall with eyes that were smoldering with no longer concealed interest. He saw the brunette squirming under his attentive gaze and avoiding any kind of further confrontation as he sank back unto the mattress, frowning as usual.

"Don't frown so much," Seifer whistled as he turned around and walked out of the bedroom. "You're gonna wrinkle that pretty face of your's. Now that'd be a shame."

Dumbfounded, Squall studied the blond's backside as he disappeared out of sight.

... "Pretty face"?

What kind of comment was _that_, anyway?

'_Why the hell does he say things like that? Guys don't say that kinda stuff to each other. What is it with him, anyway? Is he gay or something? No... he can't be. He likes Rinoa. But... I guess that doesn't really mean a whole lot, either. I, of all people, should know that much... Maybe he's bi? Does that mean he's... **hitting **on me...? No, there's no way. He's hot, he could have anyone he wants. Why would he bother with me? That's ridiculous. Fuck. Why am I even thinking about this? He's not gay, and even if he is, it's certainly none of my concern. What do I care if he's trying to flirt with me or not? I'm not interested. He'll get the hint soon enough, he can't be that thick. Well... on the other hand, he should have gotten it a long time ago... I've been rude enough to him. Why's he still so friendly, then? 'Cause he's gay and hitting on me...? Ngh. God. This is so stupid it's making my head hurt.'_

Groaning, Squall rested his forehead in his palm. He couldn't keep his mind from spiraling into a state of chaos, no matter how hard he tried. He didn't like to brood on stupid, childish, pathetic issues like these – it wasn't something he usually occupied himself with. The idea of being close to anybody scared the living hell out of him, for reasons that he had never and would never elaborate on.

To _nobody_.

And yet, despite everything, something about this new situation was unusually comforting. Seifer was different from the people that Squall had encountered in his lifetime, if only because the blond _hadn't_ walked away the moment he had become acquainted with the brunette's frosty personality. Squall didn't know and didn't understand why Seifer behaved the way that he did, but the concept did stir an interest within him that he had always believed to be non-existent.

"Hey. I told ya to quit frowning, princess. They're gonna end up having to staple your skin to your temples or shoot some botulism in ya, 'cause within a year or so you'll be sporting wrinkles like a nasty old grandpa. I've seen how they do it, too, and trust me, it ain't a pretty sight."

Squall lifted his face from his hand to meet Seifer's, a scowl still furrowing his features.

Obviously, he was less concerned about his looks than his feisty blond opposite.

"What the fuck ever," Squall bit back rudely, but before any other 'niceties' could have rolled off his sharp tongue, he suddenly noticed the large glass of water that the blond was holding out to him.

Meanwhile, Seifer was regarding him with a warm, comforting smile that lacked the sneering edge that accompanied it so often.

"Go ahead," Seifer ordered casually. "It's water, it doesn't bite."

Squall wanted to refuse, if only for the sake of being difficult and giving the blond a hard time, but something dark and intense in the green, swirling depths of Seifer's hypnotizing eyes caused him to slowly extend his arm and accept the drink all the same. He felt like a fool for being so easy to manipulate, but when the older blond looked at him like that, there was very little he could do to resist.

Out of the corner of his eyes, the glass tipped to his lips, Squall suddenly noticed Shiva prancing into the room and pushing her way past Seifer to bluntly butt her head into the brunette's knee, demanding attention.

Behind her, Seifer snarled with disapproval.

"Shiv, give him a break already," the blond groaned impatiently as he reached for the dog's black collar, but for some reason, he ended up knocking his hand into Squall's instead.

The brunette's muscles tightened slightly at the bodily contact, and a red hot singe of heat seemed to scour Squall's nerves, but his fingers remained in their spot, entwined with Shiva's fur, petting it lovingly.

"It's fine," Squall announced calmly, a faint smile gracing his features once more. "I don't mind."

With a silent nod, Seifer retracted his arm and buried his hands inside his pockets, yet again reduced to a mere spectator of the brunette's sweet interaction with his dog. The dark haired teen had set down his glass and was fighting against Shiva trying to wrestle her way into his lap – much to Seifer's amusement. Squall was good with dogs; in fact, he was much better with canines than he was with people – a thought that inevitably caused Seifer to chuckle.

"What's so funny?" Squall inquired sharply, and he glared up at the guy towering by his side.

"Nothing. You just have a way with animals, it seems. You're quite the dog whisperer. D'ya have a dog too, or what?"

The very moment that he had asked that question, Seifer could tell that he had better kept his mouth shut. Darkness poured into Squall's eyes, eradicating the bright shade of blue that had shone there only seconds before. The smile died clean on his lips as he slowly turned his head aside and his hand stopped moving across Shiva's fur.

"... No. Not anymore."

Something within Seifer's heart stung at the sight of former happiness submitting to pain on the blank surface of Squall's eyes. The brunette tried his best to hide it, but Seifer had seen enough to know that _something_ was going on. Quietly, he sank down next to Squall on the bed, but his gaze remained on Shiva's beautiful form. Seifer had gotten her as a pup for his fifteenth birthday (after throwing a remarkable tantrum, of course), and though he didn't always have enough time for her, he loved her from the very bottom of his heart.

Whatever pain it was that was haunting Squall, Seifer could symphatize with it well. If anything was ever to happen to his beloved dog, he didn't know what he would do.

Finally, he veered his head aside and studied Squall's rigid profile. The brunette had placed his hands on his knees and was staring straight ahead, caught in some sort of catatonic stupor and the remembrance of a past that he had probably rather forgotten.

"What happened, Squall?" Seifer asked gently.

At first, he was certain that he wouldn't receive an answer from the stoic brunette, but apparently, Squall thought the memory of whatever it was that had hurt him much too important to simply pretend that it didn't exist.

"He died," Squall said, his voice barely more than a whisper and grating with agony.

"He died...?" Seifer repeated softly, mildly surprised when sudden feelings of sorrow, calmness and patience overcame him. It was as if he no longer minded prying each word off Squall's tongue, just as long as the brunette kept talking and sharing his feelings. "Your dog died?"

Dark brown strands of hair were falling into Squall's face as he nodded, his fingers kneading the fabric of his jeans.

He looked so unbelievably hurt.

"What was his name?"

"... Griever."

Seifer knew that he had heard or seen that name before, but he couldn't quite pin down the thought. For the time being, it didn't matter too much, anyway – Squall looked miserable and Seifer wanted nothing more than to make him feel better. He wasn't sure whether or not it would help the brunette to talk about what had come to pass with his obviously very beloved pet, but he thought it safe to at least give the subject a try.

"What happened to him?" Seifer asked calmly. "How did he die?"

"He was put down when I was sixteen," the brunette answered bitterly. "One day after my birthday."

"Aw, shit, that's fucked up!" Seifer bit with an outraged hiss. "I'm so sorry, Squall... I really am."

Squall said nothing, but he did resume petting Shiva. He didn't like to talk about Griever and how very much his forced, pointless death had hurt him, but something about the soothing way that Seifer had spoken to him had eased the raw sting of his pain, at least by a little. He didn't know why he was telling this private, sentimental story to the blond, or why he was even in his apartment in the first place, but he no longer regretted his decision to stay.

"Yeah," he replied eventually. "Me, too."

They sat in silence for a long time, merely listening to the sound of Shiva panting. Outside, Seifer could hear rain pattering against the bedroom window, and he was glad that Squall was no longer at the playground. In fact, he was downright thankful – for a lot of things.

"Hey," he piped up, happy that Squall was meeting his gaze. "Are you hungry or anythin'? I have some stuff in the fridge... Well, I _think_ I do, anyway... Uh, lemme go check."

Before Squall could have answered him, a strangely bubbly Seifer was already out the door and in the kitchen, rumbling through his vacant refrigerator with admirable determination.

"Eh, I have beer," he shouted across the room, "And, uh... some leftover Chinese take-out... not sure if that's still any good though, it smells kinda... yurgh. Yeah, never mind that. Hmph... how about some barbecue sauce?"

"No, thanks."

Seifer almost jumped about a foot's worth into the air, startled by Squall, who had suddenly turned up right behind him. The brunette held his arms crossed before his chest, but his features had a much friendlier look to them, even in the eerie light cast by the open fridge. Apparently, the dark haired teen had set his water glass down upon the kitchen table, and Seifer smiled inwardly at the polite gesture. Someone had definitely taught that brat some manners – Seifer himself would have simply left the glass sitting on the floor and never wasted another thought on it.

"No, eh?" he chuckled, before closing the refrigerator and giving Squall a subtle look-over. "I'm hurt, Squall. You rejected my barbecue sauce."

Another small frown creased the brunette's brows, and Seifer couldn't help but stretch out his hand to ruffle the younger boy's hair playfully.

"Just messin' with ya," he lilted, even more so amused by Squall snorting reluctantly as he slipped out of Seifer's reach. "Well, if you really ain't hungry or anything, I guess we might as well head to bed."

'_Head... bed... head... hmmm, what a nice combination... hehehe... Aw, man. Pull yourself together, Almasy. You better take it slow with this one – at least give it the fair college try.'_

Smiling stupidly to himself, Seifer motioned the dark haired youth to return to the bedroom. Squall followed the wordless invitation, though not without looking at least slightly confused.

"Where do you want me to sleep?" the brunette asked innocently as they stopped in front of the bed once more, and Seifer carelessly proceeded to shove his first aid supplies onto a nearby dresser.

"Uh, the bed of course?" Seifer replied, looking perplexed by the question. "What did _you _think?"

As Seifer had already expected, the brunette screwed up his face in discomfort.

"... And where are _you_ going to sleep?" Squall countered.

"In _bed_, silly," Seifer explained with an eye-roll. "It's a king - there's plenty room for both of us, unless of course you blow up to the size of a whale while you sleep, though I seriously doubt that. In any case, I'm willing to take the risk."

It was quite obvious that Squall wasn't exactly ecstatic at the idea of sharing any less than a square kilometer of space with the blond – or _anyone_, for that matter. His eyes narrowed as he glared at the bed, then at Seifer himself. The older youth could almost smell his insecurity, though Squall did a tremendous job at hiding it.

"I can sleep on the couch... or the floor," the brunette offered weakly, but Seifer merely laughed at him.

"Nah. You ain't sleeping on the floor, sorry, princess," the blond sneered with eyes so ferally green he looked nothing short of a predator. "And as for the couch... that thing's hard as a fuckin' rock. That, and you'd be subject to Shiva's nightly cuddle onslaughts – trust me, you wouldn't get to doze off for even a minute. Like I said, the bed's big enough for the two of us and we're both guys, so what's the issue?"

After another minute of Squall staring at Seifer as if he wanted to brick him to death for his carefree attitude, the brunette finally surrendered. Sighing, he turned away and rolled his shoulders in a defeated shrug.

"There isn't one," he muttered, determined not to look like a complete moron.

He didn't trust Seifer – frankly, he trusted nobody – but he didn't necessarily believe that the blond would do anything to hurt him, either. Seifer was arrogant and thick-headed to a fault, he talked out of his ass a lot and he was annoyingly nosy, but Squall _had_ meant what he had said earlier – the blond was nicer than most people he had ever met.

Not that that was exactly saying an awful lot, either.

"Well, got that settled then," the blond declared airily as he took a teasing half-bow in the brunette's direction. "Make yourself at home, princess. There's shit in the bathroom if you wanna freshen up, by the way."

"... Thanks."

Without losing another word, a very uncomfortable looking Squall practically hurled himself past a staggered Seifer and disappeared inside the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind himself.

'_...Gee, think he might be a bit on the prude side? Nah, couldn't possibly be.'_

Chortling to himself, Seifer turned off all the lights in the apartment and locked a disappointed Shiva out of the bedroom. Then, he slipped out of his pants and shirt and carelessly tossed them to his pile of other dirty laundry, ultimately standing in nothing but a pair of silk blue boxer shorts. He could hear Squall running the water in the bathroom, and for the very first time in about a decade or so, Seifer felt a slight pang of nervousness.

'_Okay... so it's just me and the ice princess now - in one room, and one bed, no less. Whoa. Who would've thought? One way or another, I sure didn't expect having him in my bed quite this fuckin' fast. Guess I'm irresistible at last! Hah hah... Yeah, what the fuck ever. I better get a grip before I end up jumping his bones the moment he walks through that door. Don't really think he'd appreciate that one.'_

Humming innocently and inspecting his nicely chiseled abs in his floor length mirror (for a lack of better and less vain things to do), Seifer paced pointless circles around the room. He closed the drop-down blinds of his bedroom window before he resumed his walkabout, randomly picking up things and putting them back down where they _didn't_ belong, until finally, he heard Squall turning the knob of the bathroom door and slowly pushing it ajar. The blond stopped dead in his tracks in front of his immensely oversized walk-in closet, and despite his earlier, earnest resolutions, it _did_ take a lot of his self-control to refrain from throwing Squall down on the bed right then and there.

Strangely enough, the brunette wasn't even doing anything special. In fact, he merely stood there, wearing only a loose pair of black cotton boxer shorts and an adorable blush that had snuck its way to his high, elegant cheekbones. His clothes were folded neatly and tucked beneath his right arm, and as he gracefully walked by Seifer to drop them onto a nearby chair and place his boots off to the side, Squall could practically feel the blond's eyes burning into his backside.

"What?" Squall asked irritably as he turned around, trying not to stare at Seifer's sun bronzed and rather well-developed body - or _anything_ but the walls and carpet, for that matter.

_'He's got a tattoo,' _the brunette thought quietly to himself when his eyes _did_ stray to Seifer's muscular figure and the tribal band that snaked around the blond's biceps. _'Is he even eighteen yet? Tche. That's just like him. Not that I **care** what he's like. Or if he has a tattoo. Or... Okay. I'm starting to feel like a freak. Why am I still looking at him?'_

Just why on earth was he suddenly haunted by this strange sensation of embarrassment? After all, they _were _both guys. There was nothing that he should have felt strange about... at least as long as he managed to repress the memories of what had happened, and pretended that no other male had ever done him any physical or emotional harm.

"Nothing," Seifer replied casually, though Squall noticed a glint in his eyes that hadn't been there before. "Nothing at all."

With a suggestive smirk curling his lips, the blond went into the bathroom to brush his teeth and gargle with mouthwash. He figured that Squall had done the same thing, since the brunette had smelled faintly of spearmint when he had walked past him, looking all enticing and what not. As Seifer glanced at himself in the mirror, swishing Listerine through his teeth with a stupid grin on his angular face, he realized that he had no idea how he would ever manage to fall asleep that night.

When he spat out and flicked the light switch to dim the bathroom, he saw Squall standing by the edge of the bed, gazing at it in a bizarre blank. The brunette's arms were slack at his sides and only his shorts and dark hair contrasted with the white of the bandages around his wrists. His skin was sickly pale and littered with streaks of scab from his accident during gym class, his body was tightly muscled with a perfect set of abs, yet it looked almost too thin, and his eyes were dark and tired... basically, he looked like he had seen better days, and yet he was _still_ the most gorgeous thing that Seifer had ever laid his eyes upon.

'_This is going to be a long, looong night.'_

Quickly, the eighteen year old cleared his throat.

"Squall? Hey. Did you fall asleep on me or what?"

The brunette snapped out of his daze, his storm blue eyes wide like those of a child as he flinched visibly. The sight worried Seifer, somehow.

"Hey... you alright?" he asked slowly.

"Y-Yeah," Squall stuttered unwillingly before he distanced himself from Seifer and circled the bed. "It's nothing."

"Whatever you say, space cadet," Seifer replied skeptically. "Get in. I'm gonna turn off the light."

As soon as Squall had crawled beneath the black satin covers and dropped his tousled head into the pillow, Seifer shut off even the last of lights. He had no problems tracing his way to the bed even in the pitch black darkness, if only because he could have heard Squall breathing from a mile away.

The sheets were rustling softly beneath him as he laid down and punched his pillow into a more accommodating shape. Squall, on the other hand, had stopped making sounds altogether; he was simply lying there, staring at what he believed to be the ceiling. He didn't know how close Seifer was to him, and frankly he didn't _want_ to know, but he thought it safer to retreat to the far edge of the mattress and hug himself tightly to take up as little room as possible.

"Damn. Sure is dark, huh? You scared of the dark, princess?"

Seifer's voice sounded mildly amused when it cut through the silence between them, for reasons that Squall couldn't possibly fathom. He found nothing funny about this. The darkness of a nocturnal playground did little to unsettle him, but the darkness of a bedroom was an entirely different story.

The familiarity of the scene made his skin crawl with apprehension.

"You know," the blond spoke up once more, his tone provoking, "I can hear what you're thinking over there."

"Like hell you can," Squall growled back testily, the words muffled by his pillow.

"No, really. Like right now, you're thinkin' to yourself: 'Damn, Seifer's got a fine ass fucking body'!"

Seifer chuckled roughly when he heard Squall flipping onto his side and snorting derisively in response to that cocky comment – though, essentially, Seifer hadn't even been mistaken. As the blond's eyes adjusted to the dim lighting of the room, he could see that Squall had turned his back on him, and with a sly smirk curling his lips, Seifer slowly scooted a bit closer.

"It's alright," he lilted with false sympathy as he propped himself up on his left elbow, "You're not the first to be wooed by my irresistible looks."

"You're delirious," Squall huffed, while rolling onto his stomach.

Somehow, he just couldn't stay still.

"Heh. Delirious over my own awesomeness, perhaps," the blond sneered.

"Knock it off, idiot. I swear, you're mentally deranged."

"Mentally deranged? Why, that's so cute, Squall."

Seifer wasn't exactly sure why he was suddenly feeling playful like a twelve year old school girl, but he definitely did enjoy toying with the grumpy brunette. Really, Squall needed to loosen up, anyway, and this seemed like a perfect opportunity – for a vast number of things.

"Aw, c'mon," Seifer snickered, determined to coax a response out of his guest. "You're telling me you don't think I'm hot?"

"I thought you can _hear _what I'm thinking?" Squall bit back cannily.

"Well, yeah," Seifer replied as he moved his right shoulder in a well-considered shrug. "Then again, your head's awfully thick..."

Despite the fact that Seifer could see reasonably well, he hadn't exactly been prepared for the pillow that Squall had launched at him to hit him hard and square across the face. Grunting, he blinked at the brunette, who had turned onto his right side and was glaring straight at him, his left middle finger flicked up unambiguously.

With a narrow, feral grin, Seifer ran the edge of his hand across his nose and nodded evenly.

"Ah, okay, I see," he taunted softly. "You wanna play, huh?"

"_Kids_ play," Squall retorted coolly. "Contrary to some of us, I've been beyond that stage for years."

"Oh? Is that so? And here I was thinking that you only just hit puberty. Say, do you even shave yet?"

This time, he did see Squall's arm flashing out at him as the brunette shot into an upright position and his hand tried to grab a hold of the pillow that was still in Seifer's keeping. The blond continued to grin as he pushed himself upwards as well, and while he pinned the pillow down on the mattress with his left hand, he used his other to snap it around Squall's forearm.

Luckily, Seifer's fingers found a spot that wasn't slit up and enveloped by bandages, but Squall's muscles tightened at the touch all the same. Hissing a sharp curse, the dark haired youth tried to yank his arm back with every grain of force that he could muster, but he had by no means expected Seifer to follow along with the abrupt movement.

With his breath collapsing in his lungs at the surprise, Squall found himself pinned back-down on his side of the bed. Seifer was hovering above him, smiling complacently as he still held on to Squall's arm like a vice; Seifer had successfully trapped the brunette's other limb as well, victory alight in his eyes as he sneered down upon the younger teen.

"Now, that didn't work out too well, did it?" the blond mocked him smugly, while positioning his knees at both sides of Squall's waist for better leverage, firmly digging them into the mattress.

Naturally, Squall was less than thrilled by the idea of being straddled by the other youth. For a second, he couldn't do much but lie still and give the blond a perplexed look out of dark, storm grey eyes, but he didn't remain silent for long.

"W-what the fuck?" he snapped as he tried to throw Seifer to the side. "Get off me!"

"'Fraid I can't do that," Seifer replied placidly, carefully moving the brunette's arms a little higher above his head as he angled himself down to him in an image of silly pride and superiority. "Not before you admit that I'm a hot son of a bitch!"

To his surprise, Squall didn't look the least bit amused. He wouldn't stop trying to buck Seifer off, and while the blond was struggling to hold his position as upper hand, he noticed that Squall's eyes had dilated out of focus. Something wasn't right. The sight caused Seifer to sober up in the matter of a single heartbeat.

"Squall," he said as he edged back an inch or two, looking disturbed. "Hey, I'm just messing with y-"

"_No_!" the brunette beneath him choked, anger and a hint of panic etched into his voice. "Get _off_! Get the fuck off me, Almasy!"

"Alright, alright," Seifer muttered soothingly as he released Squall's arms and rolled off the brunette's body, "Relax."

Squall's breath had started to come hard and fast, and Seifer didn't like it. He laid down next to the dark haired boy without taking his eyes off him, monitoring how the brunette tried to force himself to calm down. Squall refused to look at him – instead, he stared at the empty space before him, seeing things that weren't really there.

"Squall...?"

Concern was streaking the way that Seifer murmured the unusual name. Squall heard it, fortunately, because it helped him to keep his mind from spiraling into his own little realm of insanity. The cold, stale stench of cigars and the sticky, suffocating heat that he had perceived only seconds before slowly faded away, finally and once more retreating to the dark corner of his mind that was laden with memories very few could even imagine.

Only very gradually did he start to calm down.

"You're shaking," the blond next to him observed calmly, while draping the warming covers across the brunette's nearly naked body.

"I'm fine," Squall answered, his voice tight and coarse as he turned his head away.

Seifer said nothing, knowing well that Squall was anything _but_ fine, before he started to search the bed for the younger boy's pillow. When he couldn't find it, he grabbed his own instead and rolled around to face the brunette once more.

"Lift your head for a sec," he ordered. "Please."

At first, Squall showed no sign of recognition. It took a while before he reluctantly reeled around and took the pillow from Seifer's hands, then proceeded to shove it beneath his own head carelessly and immediately resumed ignoring the blond once more.

Without having to think on it long, Seifer knew that the fragile bit of trust between them had evaporated.

"If I hurt you, I'm sorry," the blond finally stated quietly, sounding as sincere as anyone possibly could. "I didn't mean to."

Without saying another word, the eighteen year old turned over and retrieved the second pillow from the bedroom floor. He wasn't entirely sure how to handle this strange situation that had gone from a harmless joke to a downright angst fest. The brunette was still facing away from him, and Seifer studied his filigree, softly moving neck as he dropped his own head into the pillow that smelled very faintly of spice and apple.

He wanted to groan with frustration and longing.

'_This isn't going well at all... What on earth is wrong with him? I don't get it. I was just kidding... I didn't even **do** anything! He's definitely got some serious issues. First he's all playful, then he completely flips the fuck out. I mean, what the hell, dude? At least give me some sort of warning before you trip out on me. Fuck.'_

He kept contemplating the issue silently within his mind, grimacing wryly every now and then. Squall seemed to have settled down some; at least he was pulling the covers more tightly around himself and his breathing had slowed to a healthier sounding rhythm.

"Are you feelin' better?"

Squall shifted uneasily at the sound of that question. He had hoped that Seifer was done talking to him for the night, although part of him was afraid that the blond was done talking to him for good.

It was a strange combination of feelings, and he knew well enough that it made no sense whatsoever.

"... I'm fine."

Behind him, Seifer heaved an exasperate sigh.

"Do you _ever_ say anything _but_ 'whatever' or 'I'm fine'?" the blond grunted huskily as he rolled his eyes towards the ceiling. "Fuck. I mean, gimme a break here."

"What do you _want_ me to say?" Squall replied with a hard, exasperate inflection, already tired of this conversation.

What was Seifer trying to achieve with all of this, anyway? What did he want? What was _all this shit_ about? Squall had never met anyone in his life who would help a complete stranger for no reason – particularly one like himself, who had a psychotic habit of mutilating his own skin with a fucking razor blade. Seifer seemed completely normal and sane, and he seemed so different from himself – he looked so much brighter and stronger, almost glowing from within, when Squall felt nothing but hollow and dead inside. Seifer could have spent the night with Rinoa Heartilly, doing things that admittedly made Squall feel resentful towards the older boy, and yet the blond was here with _him _instead.

Part of Squall understood the meaning behind that decision, understood the spark in Seifer's hypnotic green eyes and the gentleness the blond exercised towards him, but he wanted to ignore it nonetheless.

'_Why...? Why are you so nice to me? I'm not nice to you. I never have been. So why? I don't get it and it's driving me crazy.'_

"I don't know what I want you to say," Seifer interrupted Squall's brooding with a surprisingly vulnerable inflection. "I just wish I knew what's going on inside your head. I wish I knew what you're thinking."

Swallowing, Squall clipped curtly, "I'm not thinking anything."

"... I suppose not."

Squall wasn't relieved when he heard Seifer flipping over and turning away from him, but he didn't object, either. The shock caused by Seifer straddling him had faded, maybe more quickly than he had anticipated, but the memories stayed with him. They elicited feelings that he always tried to suppress and banish for as long as he could – feelings that Seifer had yanked to the surface without knowing.

_Dangerous_ feelings.

His pulse was pounding in his arteries as he tried to drown out the blunt pain in his head and concentrate on the rhythmic sound of the blond's breathing.

Somehow, the steadiness of it was oddly soothing and unnerving at the same time.

_:: "I wish I knew what you're thinking." ::_

Squall scowled helplessly.

'_No. You don't. Trust me. You don't wanna know, and I can't tell you. It doesn't matter how much it hurts or how much I sometimes wish I could tell just one person... just **one**... I can't, and I won't. I'm not going to put my own feelings before her's. I'm not going to be selfish... she's done so much for me, it wouldn't be fair. I won't do this to her, for nobody's sake – not even my own. It would hurt her, much more than he could ever hurt me. I'll be... fine. I have to make it... just... a little bit... longer...'_

The brunette clung to those thoughts with rising despair as he forced himself to steady and keep from catching Seifer's attention. Still, he couldn't prevent darkness from pouring into his mind, clawing for even the faintest of hopes or the smallest, purest spark of emotion that Squall had never thought himself capable of feeling.

Biting down violently upon his lower lip, he dug his finger nails into the white bandage around his right wrist so fiercely that it hurt.

Squall knew he had to hold on.

Somehow.

At least for a while.

'_My... fucking... head... hurts...'_

In the end, however, Squall had only learned one way to cope with the darkness.

Only _one_.


	11. The Edge

-:-  
**Chapter 11**  
**... The Edge**

"_Why do you do this? Why? Why...?"_

-:-

I feel just like I'm sinking

And I claw for solid ground

Pulled down by the undertow

Never thought I could feel so low

Oh, darkness

I feel like letting go.

_"Full of Grace" – Sarah McLachlan_

-:-

Wet. Smelly. Hairy. Annoying.

None of these were adjectives that Seifer would have liked to associate with a wake-up call in the middle of the night, thank you very much. Yet, he could feel someone breathing into his face heavily, spangling his skin with beads of warm, musky drool. Groaning in his sleep, he tried to push the invader away and roll onto his side, but in consequence, he felt pointy teeth being plunged into his bare forearm demandingly.

"_Ow-ow-ow_! Wha... the fuck... _Shiva_! Hey! Knock it off!"

His speech was slurred due to his painfully severed sleep, and the brawny blond dug his face into his pillow while fighting to keep an impatient Shiva at a distance. His dog was standing next to the bed on her hind legs, her black front paws placed firmly upon the mattress while her tongue was lavishing the side of Seifer's face with great vigor. As the eighteen year old felt trails of drool snaking their way into his ear, he finally catapulted himself into a seating position and yelled at her for all he was worth.

"Fuckin' dumb ass mutt, leave me the fuck alone already! I'm tryin' to sleep here, goddammit! Hey, how the hell did you get in here anyw-"

When his drowsy mind finally sobered up, Seifer's vocal outburst inevitably came to a screeching halt. He couldn't see much, because it was still the midst of night, but the dim, blurry picture of Shiva sitting next to the bed, baring her sharp, white fangs at him and growling warningly, caused something within him to snap.

_Why_ was she in his bedroom? He always closed the door at night - _always_.

Gradually, the memories came pouring back to him, and he threw his head around. Frantically, he searched the room. There was a whole lot of darkness around him – darkness, tousled heaps of black satin sheets that pooled around his waist, and a bed that shouldn't have been empty.

_Shouldn't_ have been, but was all the same.

'_Ah, fuck.'_

His tired but sparking viridian gaze flew around the pitch black room, finding nothing unusual but the formerly closed door to his living-room, which had been pushed ajar just wide enough for Shiva to squeeze through. His dear classmate and reluctant company for the night, Squall Leonhart, however, was nowhere to be found, and except for Shiva's relentless panting, the whole apartment was perfectly quiet.

'_Fuck! For fuck's sake, I **knew** this was going to happen! How could I be so dumb? I'm a fuckin' idiot!'_

Convinced that his frigid brunette visitor had snuck away during the night and was now likely stumbling down some creepy, nocturnal alley of Deling City, Seifer leaped out of bed and onto his feet with numerous, nasty curses caterwauling from his lips.

"Christ fuckin' dammit, I can't believe how goddamn _naïve_ I am! I've gotta be the dumbest motherfucker ever!"

Trampling across the carpeted floor with no consideration whatsoever towards his sleeping neighbors, a half-naked Seifer charged for the bedroom door. He threw it wide open and flung his hand towards the light switch, growling with the spiteful frustration of somebody who had just been played for a complete fool.

He never _did_ turn on the light, though.

As he looked down his dark living room and open-faced kitchen, searching for nothing in particular but a stationary target to unleash his directionless anger upon, his breath jarred somewhere in his throat when his narrowed eyes fell on a sight that they had no longer expected.

Next to Seifer, Shiva was growling softly.

"What the..."

Inevitably, Seifer's loud voice trailed off into the darkness. He recognized the slim figure clad in black shorts and a long sleeved, black t-shirt that was standing in the far corner by the kitchen window. Pale moonlight was streaking through the blinds that Seifer rarely bothered to draw shut, splashing all over the figure's milky skin and dark brown, messy hair, while bouncing off the short, slender blade that the brunette boy was holding in his hands.

The figure was none other than Squall, but that blade...

It was a cold slash of silver in a cheap shell of yellow plastic, and it was also one of the most unsettling things that Seifer had ever laid eyes on in his entire life. Deep within, he felt as if someone had driven a hot scalpel through his heart, and the feeling caused a surge of fear to lance up his spine, nearly paralyzing him with shock.

But in all reality, Seifer had no time to be shocked.

Within seconds, he was by Squall's side. Seifer took no time to further analyze the situation; instead, he flung out his arm and curled his hand around Squall's right forearm. He pulled tight immediately and yanked the brunette around harshly, forcing Squall to drop the cutter he had been clutching loosely in his fingers. The cheap blade connected with the tiled floor with a hollow, clattering sound that echoed loud and profound within Seifer's mind, before it finally disappeared somewhere beneath the kitchen table.

After that, it was silent once more.

Seifer's breath was coming hard and fast as he tried to compose himself despite the raw panic that had inevitably grabbed a hold of him. He held on to Squall's arm as if he was never planning to let go, while the brunette was facing him with a solemn expression that was bleached of any kind of overt emotion. Squall Leonhart simply stood there, bathing in the cold moonlight and gazing empty-eyed at the blond youth who was panting before him.

Fortunately, it didn't take long for Seifer to regain his composure, or at least his ability to utilize his most effective organ of all – his voice.

"_Squall!_" Seifer barked the brunette's name angrily into the younger male's ears, but Squall wouldn't even bat so much as an eyelash at his hysteria. "You fuckin' idiot! What the _fuck_ do you think you're doing? Huh? Fuck, what's _wrong_ with you, goddammit?"

The dark haired teen, however, continued to refuse to acknowledge Seifer's presence, as much as his fury. He didn't even make any effort at freeing himself from Seifer's hold, no matter how much the touch hurt or bothered him; instead, his lucid features had become like those of a precious porcelain doll – fragile, beautiful and lifeless, like a toy that had been broken too many times over.

When Seifer finally dared to lift Squall's wrist in order to investigate the harm that the brunette had done during his absence, his fear was so intense that it was nearly choking him. With a raw sigh that was borne by infinite relief, however, the blond found both of Squall's limbs still enveloped by the same bandages that he himself had wrapped around them so carefully only hours before. They were untouched, but even so, the dispelled look on Squall's face told Seifer that the brunette was far from unscathed.

Squall's hair was cascading into his dark grey eyes in thick, sweat-drenched chunks, and his body was trembling subtly beneath the blond's touch. Seifer wanted to hold him, to pull him close and soothe him with all his desperate might, or at least punch some goddamn sense into him... but frankly, he didn't know what to do anymore. Squall was obviously determined to physically destroy himself, and Seifer had no idea why, or how on earth to stop him.

"Why do you do this...?" Seifer breathed, helplessness weighing down each of his words as the image of Squall's somber face burnt itself into his memory forever. "Why? Why...?"

Squall's gaze flickered to the ground, to the cutter that he knew was lying there, somewhere. A forceful shudder rocked through his thin body, but his lips phased into a false, broken smile that looked nothing short of displaced on his typically flat affect. His poor wrist was aching in Seifer's crushing hold, but Squall wasn't going to complain; by all means, if he couldn't have the sharp caress of a razor's blade that night, _anything_ would have to serve as his last anchor to sanity.

He needed that pain, _any_ pain, if only a sliver of it, and nothing else would do.

Of course, Seifer would know nothing of that.

"... You wouldn't understand even if I told you," Squall eventually replied, shrugging and chuckling softly as if he had just made some kind of sick joke.

Seifer frowned, both saddened and frustrated by Squall's statement. This wasn't the same brunette he had met on his first day at Deling City High – this wasn't the cold, arrogant, quick-mouthed asshole that couldn't be fazed by anything or anyone. His eyes were soulless, and his face was that of a person who no longer had a desire to cling on to life. For some reason, Squall seemed perversely amused by the concept of Seifer asking him for his motives, as if everything was just a sadistic, cruel game to him that the brunette could only win by losing.

"Then tell me, Squall," Seifer finally commanded, his voice as firm as it would be. "_Tell me_! At least _try_! Maybe I would understand! At least give me a chance!"

Squall continued to smile that deceiving, twisted little smile, but his brows had begun to crease in thought. Seifer stood merely an arm's length from him, and those hypnotic green eyes of his fixed him nearly desperately, demanding an explanation of some kind, as if that was going to make all the difference. Somehow, that sight caused a nearly unbearable pain to claw at Squall's heart, making it sting like none of his physical wounds ever had.

The psychotic grin finally died clean on Squall's lips when he wordlessly dropped his head in sadness and resignation. Frankly, the brunette himself didn't understand why he needed to violate his own body to quiet the chaos inside his head that threatened to overwhelm him every single day. He didn't know why he had to fight fire with fire, pain with pain, why he tried to mute the constant noise in his mind by cutting himself, but it _worked_ – that was all that he knew, and it was all the reason that he needed.

With his throat tight and aching, he lifted his left hand that Seifer wasn't holding captive and glanced upon the white gauze bandages and the crimson-spotted black fabric of his shirt, tentatively tilting his wrist from side to side.

Even that small, unimportant motion hurt in so very many ways and places.

"To... make the pain... go away."

Across from him, Seifer froze, stunned into silence by the sound of Squall's fragile, vulnerable voice that lingered even after the words themselves had long faded away. For a seemingly endless moment, he drowned in the absurdity of Squall's explanation, never understanding it any more, no matter how long he tried.

_:: "To make the pain go away." ::_

It was ridiculous. It didn't make any sense - _couldn't _make any sense, because Seifer's teenage world hadn't been created on the pillars of such cruel concepts. In his world, people took _medicine_ to rid themselves of pain, at least of the physical kind... they sought comfort from their loved ones, talked to a shrink, or they simply cried their hearts out until they could feel nothing anymore. For fuck's sake, they didn't _cut_ themselves! And yet, no matter how much he wished that he could, Seifer found himself unable to deny that Squall was telling him the truth, because the blond would have seen any lie written in the lines of his classmate's face. Evidently, Squall slit his wrists to endure some sort of greater pain, some kind of greater evil, and the thought was nothing short of horrifying to Seifer.

This wasn't how life was supposed to be when you were young.

This wasn't right.

This was fucking _unfair_.

Without saying another word or wasting another breath on things that didn't matter, Seifer simply closed the space that separated his and Squall's bodies. He released Squall's wrist as his hand found the brunette's neck instead, and when Seifer wrapped his other arm around the younger boy's shoulders in a powerful embrace, he pulled him as close as was humanly possible. He tilted his own head down to bridge their gap in heights, cherishing that unique scent of Squall's that had nearly driven him mad on so many occasions.

"There are better ways to make you stop hurting, Squall," he whispered into the brunette's ear, the urgency in his voice both fierce and desperate. "Ways that don't involve you bleeding or hurting _even more_ than you already are. Ways that won't scar you."

He could feel Squall's limp body shifting in his arms as the brunette looked up at him sadly, his eyes impossibly deep and dark at such close proximity. Seifer could have counted every single, coal black lash that rimmed those orbs of fathomless grey, Squall stood that near; he could watch the brunette's pale lips twitching, and he felt his erratic heartbeat against his own chest, pounding with the forcefulness of despair.

"What do _you_ know, Almasy..." Squall finally snorted cynically as he lowered his head again and tried to disguise his vulnerability with arrogance, "You don't know anything."

There was bitterness in those frail, almost inaudible words that Squall thrust against the naked skin of Seifer's collarbone in senseless defiance... and there was pain. So much pain. That was the moment when Seifer finally understood. This act of self-abuse was Squall's last resort, his last valve for relief from the agony that threatened to overtake and bury every part of him. The blond didn't know what could possibly cause such hurt, but he did know one thing:

He was going to fix this, no matter what he'd have to do - no matter how long it would take.

Silently, he edged their bodies apart just far enough to where he could cup Squall's jaw with his hand and tilt it upwards gently, forcing the brunette to listen to what he had to say.

"What I _know_ is that I want to help you," he murmured, decisively so, while his eyes never strayed from Squall's. "Because... I really care about you."

Squall's features curled resentfully at that statement, and he gave another snort of purest scorn, secretly wanting but not daring to believe that the blond might possibly give a damn about him.

"I don't need your pity," the younger male spat coldly as he balled his hands to fists and tried to back away from the blond's touch, but there was no longer any bite in his voice.

The confusion over Seifer's actions and words was slowly eating away at him.

Seifer felt him squirming in his grasp, trying to twist around and run away once more, but the older boy kept holding on, trapping Squall by his waist and chin. The brunette's storm grey eyes were sparking now - sparking with frustration, shame and an unsettling kind of emotional damage that seemed so far beyond repair.

The blond shook his head in a silent gesture of disapproval.

'_Pity... you really think I pity you? ... You're wrong, princess. Someone other than me might feel that way, but... for some reason, I don't think that you're pitiful in any sense or form. I don't feel... sorry for you, I guess. Not like that, anyway. I like you. I **want** you. I've wanted you ever since that day that I first saw you in the parking lot. The fact that you're broken doesn't change anything – it only means that I have to steady you. And I will.'_

"... You've understood nothing."

Squall flicked up his gaze to meet with Seifer's once more, and he flinched at the dead set determination he found in the other teenager's face. Seifer was smiling at him, sternly and stoically as he finally drowned out all of his doubts and restraints. His eyes held Squall's in mesmerizing captivity, and ever so carefully, Seifer moved his right thumb to the dry surface of Squall's bottom lip, tracing it languidly, while at the same time giving the brunette fair warning before he leaned in to kiss him.

That simple kiss was like a white hot flame that struck Squall's mind, shutting down even the most primitive mechanisms of his body as his breath was crushed clean inside his lungs by the surprise. He just stood there tilted against the blond, rendered completely motionless, every muscle in his limbs snapped painfully tight while his saucer-wide, disbelieving grey eyes were nailed to the blurriness that was Seifer's face. The fluttering warmth of Seifer's lips against his own seemed marginal compared to the scorching heat that had erupted in the center of his chest, and all those various sensations boiled into a powerful mix of emotions that he had never felt before.

'_W-what's going on... What... He's... kissing me...? But... we're both guys, we're... Why... Why am I letting this happen, why-'_

Why, deep within his tortured heart, it felt so good, despite everything.

Seifer could feel Squall tensing in his arms, semi-consciously struggling against the intrusion, but after having ventured this far, the blond was not going to simply give in. After all, he had no intentions of hurting Squall, nor did Seifer believe that he was doing anything that the younger boy wouldn't be able to handle.

It was just a kiss. Squall was a devastatingly handsome seventeen year old; he had to have received at least a couple of these ever since he had hit puberty.

_It was just a kiss._

And indeed, some unscarred part of Squall seemed to respond to the way that Seifer was hugging him, eagerly swallowing his ragged breaths with his mouth, while offering a kind of comfort that the brunette had never experienced before in his life. Maybe it was to blame on the ancient, carnal instincts that slumbered even within the ice princess' guarded soul, or perhaps merely on the brunette's initial confusion over Seifer's approach, but either way, Squall's body was losing its staticness and slowly eased into the brawny blond's touch. His lips were clumsily copying those movements that Seifer had just introduced him to for the first time, and when everything was said and done, he would've been lying if he had claimed that it didn't feel good.

As he finally seemed to abandon all restraint and permitted the blond's skillfully demanding tongue entrance, Squall had to admit that it _tasted _good, too. He noticed a faint trace of mint – probably the blond's mouthwash – and a musky, strange sweetness that Squall knew he could easily become partial to. Their bodies were only separated by ridiculously thin layers of clothing, allowing for an intimacy that was nearly unperturbed by physical barriers as Seifer ground their hips together, letting Squall feel just how deeply this kiss was affecting him.

It was a complex, confusing array of sensual impressions that, once united, made Squall believe to be the sole passenger on an out-of-control rollercoaster ride as he clung to Seifer's shirt for dear life.

'_Unh... My head... is spinning... What...'_

When he realized that Squall's defenses were caving in at last, Seifer encircled the brunette's lean waist with greater vigor. Squall was shorter and thinner than him, almost frail in semblance, yet he felt nothing like a girl. The strings of muscle that glided beneath the fabric of his black shirt were supple and strong, but perhaps they were also a bit misleading where Squall's _emotional_ strength was concerned.

Unfortunately, Seifer was too caught up in the passion of the moment to think much on that issue.

As he crushed the lithe frame against his own, he snaked his right hand beneath the hem of the brunette's shirt, impatiently traveling upwards. Squall shifted slightly at the contact, trembling as Seifer traced every arch and hollow of his hips, spine and shoulder blades with his large hands. Seifer noted with satisfaction how the younger teen was squirming now, apparently undetermined on whether he wanted to recoil or linger for more. Squall's body was responding quite pleasantly to the blond's experienced touch, obviously starved for affection. When Seifer ultimately guided the brunette backwards to the kitchen table without breaking their lip contact for even a second, Squall followed his lead all too willingly.

Seifer hooked his hands under Squall's bare thighs, feeling powerful muscles contracting as he hitched the brunette upwards and onto the table. Immediately, he stepped in between Squall's parted legs, not ready to sever their passionate kiss just yet. His hands skillfully worked up and down the smooth skin of Squall's back, pulling the brunette as close as physically possible without their bodies melting and becoming one. Squall had curled both of his hands around the edge of the table top, wrestling it for support against Seifer's conquest. He could still taste the blond's mouthwash, feel his tongue entwining with his own, and the emotions that those sensations issued right to his heart had him almost in tears. He couldn't help but want more of this, this _thing_ that managed to shut up every harrowing thought inside his mind, and when Seifer gently broke their kiss to lower Squall's back onto the hard table, the brunette did nothing to resist.

Squall lay panting heavily as Seifer pushed his shirt upwards and trailed his fingers along the brunette's sensitive sides, caressing his pale skinned, finely chiseled abdomen with only his fingertips. They had both lost their sense of reason and reality, submerging themselves entirely in this one moment that seemed drawn out of time and out of place. All the while, Seifer's emerald gaze searched Squall's tightly grimacing face, marveling over the younger boy's intoxicating beauty. Once grey eyes that were now blue with lust narrowed feverishly as they were locked upon the ceiling in a sense of embarrassment, and Squall's porcelain skin was slicked with beads of sweat that Seifer was dying to taste.

When Seifer slowly pulled Squall's body across the table, closer to his own hips, the brunette let out a cracked, broken moan – one that the older blond swallowed with yet another kiss as he moved over Squall like a panther. The brunette had closed his eyes in blind, uncharacteristical trust, while he was almost driven over the edge by Seifer hovering over him and teasingly brushing his tongue up his jugular and across his earlobe. He saw sparks of white light even though his eyes _were _shut, and Squall didn't open them again until he felt the blond retracting once more. Silently, he gazed up into orbs of purest jade and a gorgeous, heated face that was stretched into a smile so free of worries and insecurities.

Then... Squall remembered.

The looming shadow that was created by moonlight and Seifer's heavy body - the heat, the sweat and the chest that was pushing hard against his own in an echo of ragged breaths that were drawn whenever Squall's mouth was _not_ covered by a set of hungry lips; lips that had no business touching his body - had no _right_ to. Lips that would snap into a nasty, cruelly satisfied smirk - feeding on Squall's borderless hatred, the agony buried deep within his wounded soul, and the resistance in his eyes that had not been broken, ever, even after years of physical and emotional torture.

Squall's stomach coiled as the warm passion seeped away and cold reality rebound back to him at last.

Gagging, he rolled onto his side, trying to escape from this sudden, terrifying feeling of confinement. Seifer, who had his hands placed on either side of Squall's body, pulled back immediately. The dark haired boy beneath him was now coughing throatily, his body rocked by convulsive shivers as he tried to buck Seifer off.

"Hey! Hey, what's wrong?" Seifer asked with a startled hiss while trying to steady them both against the brunette's mindless struggling.

But Squall managed to push him away, and he jumped off the table with one hand clasped before his mouth. Neither of the boys even noticed the cup of water that Squall swept off the table; it loudly connected with the kitchen floor and shattered into countless slivers of sharp glass that splayed across the marble tiles like a tidal wave. Wide-eyed and unsure of what to do, Seifer could only watch how the brunette stumbled for the guest bathroom by the front door and dropped onto his knees before the toilet – a frightening image that was quickly followed by the sound of violent regurgitation.

"_Squall!_"

Seifer had hurried to the brunette's side long before he had even had a chance to comprehend what exactly was going on. Squall was shuddering heartbreakingly as he emptied what little content his stomach had held into the chlorinated water before him. Seifer knelt next to him on the cold, tiled floor, and he moved one hand across Squall's back in small and soothing circles. He murmured disjointed, unimportant words that sounded vaguely reassuring to his own ears, but that did nothing to calm the miserable brunette cowering on his bathroom floor.

"Squall... It's okay... It's alright... You're okay... It's alright, Squall... It's okay... Shhh..."

When Squall finally stopped vomiting, his gagging had transformed into hoarse, wet hiccups. He tried to suppress his childish, helpless weeping as both of his hands cramped around the toilet seat, but something within him was trembling so brutally that he had no idea how to stop it. Images and feelings thus far mostly suppressed now came crashing down on top of him, burying beneath them his ability to breathe and every rational thought he'd ever had.

He felt like he was dying.

Seifer watched with worry how the brunette's knuckles went as surgically white as the ceramic toilet before them. Immediately, he cupped them with his own hands and carefully pried them loose – the vomit and urine he spoiled his own skin with didn't even faze him. Robbed of his only means to steady himself, Squall practically collapsed in Seifer's arms. The brunette wanted to scream and cry and hit someone, _anyone_, but all he could do was hitch oxygen to his lungs at manic speed while his legs shuffled across the tiles.

Seifer squatted behind him, steadying the younger boy against his chest while trying to understand what on earth had just come to pass. All the while, he continued to mutter senselessly, his voice warm and gentle while his thoughts became more and more incoherent.

It took a long time before Squall finally calmed down. His muscles stopped spasming and his tearless sobbing ceased, but Seifer found the sudden stillness of his body nearly as disturbing as the brunette's previous hysteria. The air was laden with the sharp, sour stench of vomit, recapturing at least parts of the blond's attention; Seifer figured it best to move Squall into another room before he'd get re-acquainted with his dinner yet _again_.

"Squall," Seifer whispered, unsure whether his voice would hold. "Hey... you're gonna make yourself sick again if you stay in here. Let's go to the bedroom."

Squall showed no physical sign of recognition at the blond's words; his head was drooping low and he still twitched every now and then as flashes of memories licked through his mind like flames through a burning building. He hardly even felt Seifer hooking his arms beneath his own and hauling him upwards, but he _did_ notice that his legs clearly wouldn't support his weight. His knees buckled beneath him and he closed his eyes to ready himself for the impact with the floor, but fortunately, Seifer had never actually let go of him. In fact, the blond kept Squall in an upright position quite effortlessly, though he wasn't entirely sure as to what to do next. Seifer had never been the vomiting type (minus those nights when he had been so drunk that he had completely blacked out), hence he didn't quite know how to make his classmate more comfortable.

Well, perhaps his best bet was to start simple.

"You should rinse out your mouth," the eighteen year old suggested, already ushering Squall in the direction of the sink. "Come on. I'll help you."

Squall mechanically took a few steps, still dependent upon the blond for support. Seifer was mirroring his motions as he walked behind him, one arm slung around his torso. The more Squall tried to think a clear thought or understand what had just happened, the more his head was spinning. Thus, he simply followed Seifer's guidance like a puppet on strings, willingly pushing his hands into the gush of water that erupted from the faucet that Seifer had turned on for him. The coldness felt impossibly good, even if his body already had a much closer resemblance to an icicle than he liked. He was freezing despite the warmth offered by Seifer's body, but he splashed his face and rinsed his mouth with the tap water all the same. It chased the blurriness from his head, at least by a little, and as he cast a weak, half-lidded glance into the mirror before him, he could see his own, ghostly looking face and the taller blond standing right behind him. Seifer wasn't saying a word, but he was monitoring his every movement apprehensively out of hawk-like, sharp green eyes.

'_He's... I... We... D-did we really... did I...'_

Shuddering inwardly, Squall blinked at the toilet to their left.

'_... Oh god...'_

Groaning, he buried his face in the hollow of his right hand. His stomach was starting to revolt again, but to Squall's fortune, Seifer had a fairly firm grasp on the situation – and on him. The blond had washed his own hands and was now using them to gently lead his younger classmate out of the sickly smelling bathroom and into the living room. They discovered Shiva sitting quietly next to Seifer's couch, watching the odd couple out of patient, glacier blue eyes. Seifer knew that he owed her a thanks for waking him up, but there would be better times to shower her with doggie treats; for now, he was too busy taking care of his _human _companion.

He walked the brunette into the bedroom, where he turned on a light and mutely ordered the dark haired boy to sit down on the disheveled bed. Squall didn't seem entirely comfortable with the idea, but he was too worn out to offer any noteworthy resistance. He sank into the sheets and trained his dull, empty gaze upon the floor, while his mind was being flooded with painful memories once more. Squall didn't know why he had been able to drown them out so effortlessly only a few minutes before, but now everything came snapping back to him like a rubber band.

"Squall," a concerned voice in front of him called his name. "Do you want some water? You should drink something."

Unsurely, he glanced at the blond kneeling before him. Seifer's eyes were so ridiculously green, his face so calm and stoic. This guy was obviously interested in him; a kind of interest that Squall seemed to share, but nonetheless did not understand. For once, he had actually _allowed_ himself to let go of his fears and ignore what had happened to him in a past that was far from forgotten - only to end up puking all over Seifer's once pristine looking bathroom.

He had never felt like a more of a dumbass.

"Squall."

Seifer was still talking to him, watching him worriedly, until Squall remembered the blond's initial question. Very slowly, he shook his head.

"I don't want anything."

"You sure?"

"Yeah..."

"Okay," Seifer started carefully, while pushing himself up from his kneeling position and slowly sitting down next to his classmate. "Squall... what the hell just happened?"

Squall stared at some miniscule fuzz balls on the carpet before him and studied them with faked interest. His head was aching with the strain of trying not to think. He found himself wanting to look at Seifer, even wanting to lean against him for support, but he did neither of the two.

"... I don't know," he finally answered, his voice tense and low.

Seifer could literally watch him clamming up as the bit of trust and confidence that had built up between them seemingly melted into thin air. The blond had no idea why the brunette had reacted to his advances the way he had, but he did know that he had to get to the bottom of this.

"Did I do something wrong?" Seifer asked, sounding guilty.

"No," Squall answered almost instantly.

"Then what's going on? I don't understand. Did I go too far?"

"No."

"Fuck, I must have done _something_ wrong or else this wouldn't have happened!"

Squall sighed – a small sound that was echoing and aching methodically in both of their hearts. What, of all things, was the brunette supposed to say? He wasn't upset over Seifer kissing him, odd as that might have seemed to him at the moment, but there was no reasonable explanation for his freakish behavior that he could have possibly _ever_ presented to the blond.

None that _didn't_ entail the term "rape" or "abuse", both of which words he was never going to utter to another human being.

There was nothing that he could say.

"Squall, I-"

And yet, he _wanted_ to. For the first time in his life, Squall felt like he owed somebody an explanation.

"You didn't do anything wrong, okay?" Squall interrupted the blond quietly, while massaging his forehead with the edge of his hand. "It wasn't you."

"But-"

"Look, I... I don't know what to tell you, except that it wasn't your fault," the brunette explained helplessly, trying to salvage whatever was left of their budding friendship while he still could. "I'm sorry for what happened back there. For everything I did... or didn't do. I... I didn't mean to freak you out. I've been a pain in the ass... all night. I'm sorry."

Seifer blinked at that apology, but Squall wouldn't meet his gaze. The brunette seemed to have calmed down considerably, though he still looked embarrassed and haunted by demons whose nature Seifer could only guess. Gently, Seifer draped one of his arms around Squall's shoulder, and even though the dark haired boy tensed briefly at the unexpected touch, he did not pull away.

"You're not a pain in the ass, stupid," Seifer stated evenly as he tilted Squall's head against his chest. "I'm just trying to understand what's going on here."

"... Sorry."

"Don't apologize. Just talk to me, Squall."

'Talking'... it had never been something that had come easy to Squall, but there were few times it had seemed as difficult as it did tonight. He could feel the other boy's hand brushing through his hair, gently detangling and sweeping away sweat-drenched tresses that coiled into his face. He knew that Seifer was trying to make him comfortable, and while he appreciated the gesture for what it was, he knew that it was pointless.

_'You're... wasting your time.'_

"What happened back there, Squall?" the blond continued to coax persistently. "I just want to understand, you know? I really do like you, and I don't want it to happen again."

Squall creased his thin brows at that remark, wondering at its meaning, even if there really wasn't much to wonder about. After all, Seifer had _kissed_ him back there, in the kitchen, but by doing so he had filled Squall's mind with so much confusion that not much seemed to make sense anymore. Of course, in the end, his reaction to Seifer's romantic advances was hardly a surprise. After all, the only other experiences with physical affection he had gathered up to that point had been far from pleasant...

In fact, they had been downright brutal.

_:: "I really do like you." ::_

'_I don't understand. __What could you possibly like about me? I cut my wrists 'til I feel like the pain is going to kill me. I have **sex** with the man who's supposed to take care of me like a goddamn fucking father. I'm completely fucked up, don't you see that?'_

"Squall. Seriously, just talk to me. What are you thinking?"

Realizing that Seifer wouldn't drop the subject without an explanation of some kind, truthful or not, Squall figured he'd have to resort to his usual measure of deflecting questions that had become just a little too personal.

Lying.

"I don't know what exactly happened," he started, while performing a vague gesture with his hand. "It was just... a lot at one time. I was already feeling lightheaded from the blood loss, I guess. All the... movement just made me sick."

"Are you sure? It seemed like more than that," Seifer asked skeptically.

"That's all I can think of."

"So... you didn't freak out because I made a move on you?"

"No."

While he was talking, Squall tried to ignore the fact that Seifer was hugging him, and he focused on the carpet once more. The blond was still caressing his hair in that intimate, soothing kind of way, and yet the touch bothered Squall. The bodily contact felt good, and at the same time, it didn't. None of it made any sense, and he wanted to scream at the absurdity of those feelings.

"Okay," Seifer responded slowly. "I was kinda worried about that, to be honest. You're not mad at me, then?"

"No," Squall replied with a frayed sigh, getting weary of the conversation. "I'm not mad."

He couldn't see the involuntary smile that sparked across Seifer's lips. Despite what had happened that night and the vast array of questions that had inevitably blossomed within his mind, Seifer was glad to know at least that much.

"So what you're saying is, you tripped out because of the blood loss?" the blond continued to pry.

"I didn't 'trip out,'" Squall breathed coolly, though he was fully aware of the fact that he had done exactly that.

Seifer arched a thin, golden brow accordingly.

"You didn't?"

With a frustrated growl, the brunette in his arms attempted to struggle free, but Seifer continued to hold him in place by his shoulders. He just couldn't help the feeling that something was odd about Squall's explanation. He had seen Squall's eyes back then, on the kitchen table, right before the brunette had bolted for the bathroom; to say that Squall had looked scared shitless would have been a blatant understatement.

If he had truly enjoyed their kiss, why would he suddenly flip a lid?

'**_Did _**_he even enjoy it? Now that I think about it, I don't remember him gettin' hard at all.'_

It was a question worth asking.

"... Did you like it? When I kissed you, I mean."

A frown pulled on Squall's fine features in response – it was the kind of question he most certainly did not feel inclined to answer.

'_Why do you have to ask something like that? After all... I kissed you back, didn't I? Of course, that was before I started barfing and sobbing like a little kid, huh... Whatever. I guess for all it's worth, I did like it, but... I really don't want to...'_

"... talk about this..."

"What?"

It took Squall a minute to realize that he had finished that sentence out loud, and he quickly slipped free from Seifer's embrace while he'd caught the blond off guard. He retreated a few inches to his side of the bed, if only to start massaging his kneecaps in a nervous kind of tick.

"Say what, Squall?" Seifer asked.

"... Nothing."

"Nothing my ass," the blond retorted with a grunt. "Talk to me. Don't just shut off like that."

"All I said was that I _don't_ wanna talk about it," Squall mumbled unwillingly.

"What? Fuck, you can't just pretend nothing happened!"

"Says who?"

"Fuckin' hey, I-"

"I'm not pretending that nothing happened... okay?" the brunette interrupted Seifer calmly, unwilling to spark another argument tonight. "I just don't wanna talk about it, that's all."

Sighing, Squall pushed himself onto his wobbly legs. He had endured enough conversation for the night. He hadn't talked to someone like this in months, _years_ – hell, he didn't think that he had _ever _bothered to talk to anyone about his feelings or the state of his mind.

Honestly, he couldn't even say what had changed – why Seifer was different from everybody else.

Perhaps it only mattered that he _was_.

"Hey. You shouldn't walk around yet. Where are you goin'?"

Squall cast the blond a curt look over his shoulder, and he couldn't help but feel moved by the open concern in those emerald green eyes.

"Laying down," he answered, trying to keep his voice at a level of monotony.

"... Okay."

Seifer was feeling anxious and curious - to a point where he really wasn't willing to go to bed just yet - but he did understand that Squall probably needed rest more than anything at the moment. He didn't know how much he liked the sound of that, truly, but for once, this wasn't about him and what _he_ wanted. He didn't know what was wrong with Squall (in fact, he had little to no clue at all), but he sensed that the brunette needed him to be understanding right now, and not much else aside from that.

So he would be, at least until he figured out a more effective course of action.

There'd always be another morning and another day to ask questions and figure out just what exactly was going wrong in the brunette's life. It wasn't like he'd be able to fix it all in one night, anyway. He wasn't usually the type to take things slowly, but just this one time, he was determined not to ruin a good thing by demanding too much at once. For some reason, there wasn't a doubt in his mind that Squall would be well worth the extra effort.

Meanwhile, Squall had circled the bed and peeled himself out of his dirty shirt. Seifer found that the brunette's skin looked a lot paler than usual, but he pushed the thought away. After all, who _wouldn't_ look pale after a night like this?

When the dark haired boy had haphazardly straightened out the covers and eventually crawled beneath them, Seifer shut off all the lights and returned to bed.

This time, he didn't close the living room door.

As he nuzzled his head into the pillow and turned onto his left side, he could merely see the outline of Squall's body. The brunette was situated on his back, trying to breathe normally. He had to fend off the memories, the scents and the tastes of this night and all the nights that had preceded it; he knew they weren't the same, but they were similar enough.

This wasn't the first time he had lost control and ended up vomiting, either. Usually, he was glad when it didn't happen in school, the mornings after... like that one time when Seifer had found him walking out of the bathroom.

'_...'_

"... Shit, your bathroom!"

For some odd reason, the realization of having vomited all over the blond's toilet overlapped with the memory of that one particular morning when Seifer had almost walked in on him puking his insides out in the school lavatory.

"... W-what?"

Seifer sounded a bit drowsy, but it was probably confusion more so than it was sleepiness.

"What are you talkin' about, Squall?" the blond continued. "What about the bathroom?"

Squall glanced at the brawny blotch of blackness still lying curled up in the covers, shifting unsurely. Was Seifer kidding him? He could have hardly forgotten what state his bathroom was in.

"I messed up your toilet... I should clean up," the brunette elaborated after a long moment of silence.

Next to him, Seifer breathed a long, low-pitched grunt.

"... Are you outta your fuckin' mind?"

Squall frowned disapprovingly at that remark, though the disbelief in Seifer's husky tone had been sort of amusing. Nevertheless, the brunette gradually proceeded towards the edge of the bed, but before he could have set so much as a toe on the floor, Seifer had already trapped him by the waist and yanked him back with surprising determination.

"Just where do you think you're going, huh?"

Growling, Squall attempted to push Seifer's hand away – not so much because it bothered him, but because he felt the need to take care of this. He couldn't leave a mess like that and simply go and count sheep or the number of screws he had probably kissed good-bye that night. It just wasn't in his borderline obsessive-compulsive nature.

"I didn't even _flush_," Squall protested, but found himself silenced when Seifer gave his waist a more determined tug and dragged him across the mattress until he was spooned flat against the blond's larger body. "I need to-"

"Squall, you really think I give a shit?" Seifer interrupted him with a growl. "I want you to get some sleep, not clean my fuckin' bathroom at three in the morning. Don't worry about it, alright? I'll handle it tomorrow."

"Maybe you don't care, but I do," Squall replied testily.

"Tough luck, princess. You're staying."

"But-"

"Look, Shiva ain't using it and we can go piss in this one. That's all that _I_ am worried about as far as bathrooms are concerned."

Despite Seifer's fairly blunt expression of his opinion, Squall was still bristling against the thought of not taking care of the issue right then and there. He tried to free himself of the blond's embrace once more, but Seifer's arms were like fucking vices. Snorting with a sort of stubborn frustration, the brunette threw his head into the pillow.

"I don't like the idea of my dinner doing laps in your toilet, alright?" he bit.

Behind him, Seifer was shifting with a long, throaty sigh. Squall couldn't help but flinch when he suddenly felt the blond's nose brushing against his ear and his breath ghosting his neck.

"Squall, I never thought I'd say this, but..." Seifer started, his voice rough and low as he breathed a soft kiss on the brunette's earlobe, "Shut up."

With that, he settled as close to Squall as he could, wrapping one arm around his lean waist almost possessively. Squall blinked blankly at the wall that was straight in front of him, not sure whether he should feel insulted or not. Seifer's touch registered with him, but this time it didn't set off any alarms. Some of his defenses had irreversibly been breached, if only because he was worn out and almost too tired to remember his own name.

"Shut up" were the last words spoken between them on that very first night, right before sleep took them over and frightening memories became meaningless shadows, while they laid loosely spooned together, weaving dreams of love that might or might not come true.


	12. Chocolate And Coffee

-:-  
**Chapter 12  
Chocolate and Coffee**

"_Don't flatter yourself into believing that you know what I'm thinking."  
_-:-

"... wake him up! Shoo! Ah, man... just go chew on my shoes or something like that. Stop fuckin' pulling!"

'_... Hh... Unh... what the... huh?'_

Squall Leonhart wasn't used to waking up to anything but the methodical, stoic beeping of his alarm clock, so he was accordingly confused when his peaceful slumber was interrupted by a low voice muttering incoherently somewhere... above him?

'_Above...? Why...'_

There wasn't just that, either. Strangely, the flat, squishy surface he'd been resting on didn't exactly seem very steady anymore. Instead, Squall perceived movement on top of him, around him and below him – a discovery that he found somewhat unsettling, to be quite honest.

Very slowly, his eyelids peeled open over a blank surface of unclouded slate blue that was, despite its sleepy state, glowing from deep within. Squall blinked once or twice against the blurriness in his sight, if only to blink once more and much faster this time in utter confusion at the bizarre picture that had snapped into focus before him.

_Someone_ was hovering above him; their torso was crossing over his own, while both of their knees were placed on the right side of Squall's body, dug firmly into the mattress for support.

'_W-what... who...'_

When Squall allowed his mind to stray from this awkward situation and reminisce for a moment, he finally remembered that brawny guy above him to be Seifer Almasy, his classmate and host for the night. The cocky blond, however, wasn't paying much attention to him, but rather to something that seemed to linger by Squall's left side – off the edge of the bed.

Then, Squall noticed a subdued noise, which sounded dangerously like the feral snarl of an animal, cutting through the warm morning air.

"Yo! Don't growl at me, stupid dog! Let go already! You're gonna wake him up!"

Intrigued by the blond's cautious hiss, Squall veered his head around to where he guessed Seifer's hands to be. To his mild surprise, his eyes clashed with a pair of cool, arctic blue orbs and two rows of sharp fangs that were locked tightly around their helpless prey – which, interestingly enough, just happened to be Seifer's pillow.

'_... What the hell is going on here?'_

As if Seifer had literally _heard_ him wondering what was happening, the blond youth suddenly shifted his focus from his dog Shiva to his drowsy bed companion, Squall Leonhart. With surprise, Seifer noted that the brunette was gazing up at him with his thin brows arched to his hairline, a sort of unsure and irritated look glowering in his wide, still sleepy eyes. Seifer paid him a quick flash of a smile, before whisking his head around to Shiva once more.

"Told ya you'd wake him up," he chided, sounding annoyed. "Why can't you just lazy around and sleep all day like _normal_ dogs do? Well, guess what, no bagel for _you_ this morning, missy! Hah!"

Triumphant like a general that had just returned victorious from battle, Seifer sat up slightly and beamed down happily upon the brunette boy who was lying beneath him, motionless like a statue, and who was doubtlessly questioning his sanity.

"Sorry 'bout that," Seifer purred and squinted one of his emerald green eyes in a charming wink. "Guess she thought it'd be a grandiose idea to come and wake us up. Make a long story short - I had to smack her with my pillow. Stupid ass do-"

Distracted by his dark haired friend's early morning beauty, Seifer failed to realize that Shiva wasn't _quite_ done toying with him yet. On the contrary, she gave the "prize" her master had been holding onto a powerful tug that sent a preoccupied, smugly grinning Seifer face forward into the mattress – and right onto poor Squall, for that matter.

The brunette let out a strangled gasp as the approximately 210 pound weight that was Seifer's body collapsed on top of him, knocking the wind out of his lungs with the force of a steamroller. Seifer himself gave a surprised grunt and let go of his pillow as he found himself flattened across Squall's waist, looking suitably stunned.

"Ow! _H-hey_! Get off, idiot!"

Apparently, Squall had already overcome the initial moment of surprise, because Seifer could feel him struggling and heard him growling in repulsion as he tried to push the blond away. Seifer rolled around to face him, snorting sullenly, but he made no effort to actually pry himself off his newly acquired, albeit fairly bony cushion.

"Why, good morning to you too, sunshine," the blond drawled lasciviously, baring perfect white teeth.

In response, Squall gave him another decisive shove, which only resulted in the blond willingly sliding down to the general area of the brunette's groin, where he happily lingered, dangerously calm and attentive like a famished wolf in a flock of innocent sheep.

"Well, well, well... I kinda like this," Seifer chuckled deep in his throat, provocatively running one hand along the sheet-covered inside of Squall's thigh, while his predatory green eyes glinted at his companion.

The brunette twitched at the touch and snarled warningly, but to his great dismay, none of his physical endeavors proved any useful at all. Finally, he pitched his head into his pillow, hissing in frustration.

"Knock it off!" he commanded with a pissed off growl, his voice strained and impatient as he tried to kick out at the blond one last time. "And move it, asshole, you're heavy!"

"What? I'm not _that_ heavy!" Seifer replied glumly, feigning hurt.

"Bullshit. You probably weigh about a metric ton!"

"Aw, are you saying I'm _fat_?" the blond asked, already chortling with barely constrained laughter as he clutched his chest. "That really hurts, Squall. My heart's bleeding, _bleeding_ you hear? How am I ever going to feel sexy in a bikini again now?"

Squall rolled his eyes towards the ceiling in mute plea, before breathing a low-pitched groan that was a guttural blend of both frustration and annoyance over Seifer's shameless amusement.

Apparently, the blond thought this whole thing to be fucking hilarious.

'_... Considering the complete weirdness of this situation, I suppose it **is **sort of funny... in a very stupid, irritating kinda way.'_

Something inside of Squall was beginning to feel uncharacteristically... humored. Seifer was smirking at him daringly, languidly tapping the long fingers of his left hand on the flat surface of Squall's abdomen as if he was waiting for something in particular. When Squall's gaze scanned the blond's mischievous face and inevitably focused itself on Seifer's lips, a slight blush crept to the brunette's cheeks as he suddenly recalled the passion-filled events of the night before.

Not that he had ever _truly_ forgotten.

"No," he finally replied lightly, trying to mimick Seifer's bold, teasing behavior. "You're not fat, exactly, but you're a horrible fucking kisser."

The very moment that that careless sentence had rolled off his tongue, Squall wanted to smack his own forehead in disbelief, or better yet, run it square into a concrete wall. He, the guy who never opened his mouth before giving each word very careful consideration, had just blurted out something outrageous like _that_?

'_... "You're a horrible kisser"? Did I really just say that? What the hell was I **thinking**? I can't believe I'm actually **reminding** him of what we did! What the fuck is wrong with me?'_

And of course, Seifer wouldn't be Seifer if he'd let such a perfect opportunity slip.

"Oh, is that so, huh?" the eighteen year old sneered softly, tilting his head to the side. "A horrible kisser, you say?"

Seifer was chuckling slyly as he left his chosen position on Squall's body and slowly crawled upwards along his torso. He laid down next to the brunette, who had to swallow against the lump that had suddenly formed in his throat; as Squall stared up at Seifer out of blue eyes that were wide with mistrust, he was finally getting a grasp on what sort of retaliation his hasty and taunting words had provoked.

"Hmm... Guess I need more practice, then..."

'_Practice...?'_

Squall winced at the seductive tone that had meshed with Seifer's voice, but even more so at the feeling of the blond's lips suddenly colliding with his own. Seifer had hooked one hand around Squall's neck and was pulling the brunette into him now, robbing him of both breath and reason. Squall's hands struggled to find some sort of hold, to perhaps even manage to push Seifer off, but it seemed as if his brain had abandonden all rational thought processes a long, long time ago.

'_W-wait... w-wha... whoa...'_

Squall had never _truly_ kissed another person before, not until the previous night, anyway, and though he certainly didn't dislike the act of it, it was still far too difficult for him to relax and surrender to the niceness of it all. Painful memories were clinging to his mind, coating it like dark varnish, and even though he would have gladly released said memories at any given time, they stuck with him like a disease that no doctor would ever be able to cure.

Despite his discomfort, however, Squall's muscles refused to obey his commands, and his heart was starting to pound in his chest, picking up its pace the longer and more passionate Seifer's kiss grew.

'_Am I... supposed to allow this to happen? Shouldn't I resist? I could push him away if I really tried... After all, I never consented to this, did I? ... **Did** I?'_

The thought caused Squall to frown just slightly, but he quickly forgot all about his dilemma when Seifer ran his tongue teasingly across his bottom lip and brushed his hand along the brunette's bare side in a fleeting touch. Squall started at the contact, but he could hear Seifer whispering a soothing "shhh" against his cheek. The blond's beard stubble scratched Squall's chin as their lips touched once more, but Squall did neither notice nor care. As frightening as this intimacy might have been, it also felt no less amazing, which was a weird concept all in itself; to Squall, physical affection hadn't been anything of pleasance in over three years. Yet, there he was, trapped by his own confusion and moaning very faintly into Seifer's mouth as his eyelids fluttered close and he felt the blond smiling against his lips with satisfaction.

Inevitably, his head was starting to spin again.

Fortunately, Seifer seemed at least semi-willing to stick to his credo of "taking things slowly", because he finally interrupted their kiss and withdrew a few inches. He loved the sight of Squall's flushed, almost embarrassed face, but even more so did he enjoy the carnal spark that had come alight in the brunette's typically frigid, storm blue eyes.

"Well..." he breathed languidly, while licking his lips in a way that lanced sharp spikes of heat up Squall's spinal column, "You sure taste good, even with morning breath."

As Seifer had anticipated, the brunette's features curled abruptly and his sweetly disjointed gaze snapped into his trademark death glare. Laughing good-naturedly at that priceless expression, Seifer rolled over and dropped into the mattress, filled to the brim with rapture and bliss over this rather exquisite start into a Saturday that could have easily turned out as ordinary as any other. Despite the fact that Squall kneed him sharply in the side for his impudence, Seifer had absolutely no problems declaring this one of the best mornings of his entire life.

"Yeah, _fuck you_ too, Almasy!" the sour brunette next to him bellowed when Seifer just wouldn't cease laughing, although an unsteady, amused undertone had kindled with Squall's voice as well.

Somehow, everything looked so much better and brighter in the light of a new day.

Sighing impatiently, Squall finally pushed the covers over Seifer, thus burying the blond's loud mouth under a bulk of black satin. Then, he leaped onto his bare feet as lightly as his aching body would permit, while inwardly smiling at Shiva, who was curled up next to the bed, contently chewing on Seifer's pillow.

'_Serves him right.'_

Circling the bed with a certain air of passive grace and arrogance, Squall silently headed for the bathroom. He stopped dead in his tracks, however, when a pillow suddenly creamed him square across the side of his face with enough force to at least cause him to halt and blink dumbstruck.

"Awooo! Hahaha, got ya good!"

Seifer had apparently struggled free from the covers and was sitting cross-legged like a very naughty chieftain, glowing with pride over his perfect toss. Needless to say, Squall regarded him with a look that suggested murder, but in the end, the brunette opted for folding his arms across his chest and snorting smugly instead.

"You," he started, the edge to his voice sharp as his lips stretched into a cold sneer, "Throw like a fucking girl."

"Heeey now, princess, that's not very nice," Seifer retorted, mocking outrage.

"Neither is throwing pillows at people."

"You're one to talk. You tried to get me _twice_ last night!" Seifer retorted while holding up his right index- and middle finger.

"Whatever," Squall replied monotonously, rolling his shoulders in a cool shrug.

Twisting his eyes towards the ceiling at the brunette's generic reply, Seifer jumped off the bed as well, bouncing on his toes as he hit the ground. Squall was studying him warily out of glittering, narrowed blue grey eyes, but the blond merely heeded him with a bright smirk that didn't look too unsettling - yet.

"Well, anyway," Seifer chanted blithely as he slowly walked up to the other youth, fully aware of Squall's storm grey orbs flickering in silent warning. "How does a shower sound to you, princess? Hmmm?"

Squall's eyebrows cocked upwards ever so slightly, though the brunette immediately scolded himself for even displaying any sort of reaction to Seifer's suggestive "invitation". On the other hand, he _needed_ a shower and wanted it all the more, though he considered it best to make it very clear that this was not going to evolve into any kind of group activity.

"Fine," he finally replied, his voice steady enough as he turned his head away. "Go ahead. I'll wait 'till you're done."

"Wait? Wait for what? We can shower at the same time, sweet cheeks."

Seifer had to bite down a laugh over the faint blush that tinged Squall's cheekbones. He could read the brunette like an open book, at least where these somewhat obvious matters were concerned; Squall was at the verge of blowing a blood vessel at the prospect of taking a shower with anyone but himself. Chuckling, the blond sashayed past his classmate and slapped his ass amicably, though the gesture only elicited a hitched, irritated growl from Squall's end.

"Don't fucking do that, asshole!"

"Aw, don't get your panties in a knot," Seifer purred as he opened his walk-in closet and disappeared within its seemingly fathomless depths. "Shower orgies are a blast. You'll love it."

Frowning, Squall listened to him rummaging around; the brunette stood tensely in the middle of the bedroom, his right hand fastened around his bare hip and his eyes filled with mistrust as he shifted his weight from one leg to the other. It didn't take long before Seifer re-emerged and approached him with an unreadable smirk. To the brunette's surprise, he was holding out a red piece of clothing for Squall to grasp.

Blinking in confusion, the younger teenager gazed upon it as if in a daze.

"Your shirt's filthy," Seifer explained patiently. "I'll wash it for you tonight, just wear this instead. And by the way, you may breathe again – I was kidding about the orgy. You 'prolly don't remember, but there's a second shower in the guest bathroom."

To Seifer's mild surprise, the brunette in front of him continued to stare at the shirt in his hand, his features twitching slightly.

'_Red... it's red... I don't wear red...'_

"What?" the blond grunted questioningly. "Any objections, your highness?"

When he again received no reply, Seifer eventually shoved the shirt into Squall's arms with an exasperate sigh, before lowering his head to the brunette's once more.

"Me – Seifer," he cooed in his best Tarzan expression, delighted that Squall's darkened eyes finally met his. "This – my – loincloth. You – wear. By the way, uh, you don't happen to be Jane, do you?"

A hiss of air swished through Squall's ground teeth as he whipped around, the shirt clutched tightly to his chest.

"Stupid ass."

As Squall edged away to the only _neat_ stack of clothes in the entire bedroom in order to grab his pants and socks, he suddenly remembered something aside from Seifer's kisses and overwhelming closeness of the night before – he remembered what he had wanted to take care of hours ago.

"Your bathroom..."

Seifer watched with wordless interest how Squall was fidgeting with his attire, his back turned on him. Finally, the brunette threw him an evasive half-glance across his shoulder, but somehow, all Seifer suddenly managed to focus on were the smooth, almost water-like movements of Squall's neck, the way his back tapered into a slim waist and how each ever so fine string of muscle shifted beneath the silky plains of his ivory skin.

'_Fuck, he's hot.'_

"Seifer?"

"Ah... oh... uh... right..." the blond coughed, quickly clearing his throat while willing the heat away from his lower extremities. "Don't worry about that. I'll take care of it."

"But-"

"Hey, all I gotta do is wipe down the sink and toilet, alright?" he grinned, waving his hand dismissively. "No big deal. Go take your shower."

Squall had finally swiveled around to face him, his semi-clean pants, shirt and socks resting loosely in his arms. Despite the steely resolve in his turbulent eyes, he looked lost somehow.

"I want to do it, though... _I_ caused the mess, after all. It's my fault, not your's, so it's my responsibility."

Seifer couldn't possibly explain it, but his heart had started to ache terribly at the vulnerable, guilt-stricken tone that had kindled with Squall's voice. The brunette could be a pain in the ass alright, but regardless, Seifer had _never_ felt this way before, about anyone – so sentimental, protective and helpless at the same time. Whatever this stubborn guy was doing to him with his damned pretty face and enigmatic grey eyes, it sure was working like a charm. Almost without his own volition, Seifer found himself walking over to the brunette and wordlessly drawing him into his arms, clutching Squall's thin body as tightly as he could while burying his face in his chocolate brown, tousled hair with a sigh.

"Uh... H-hey, Seifer, what..."

Squall's arms were trapped between their two bodies, causing the brunette to squirm uneasily in that position. He was quite taken aback by Seifer's hug, to say the least. He had witnessed with surprise how the blond's emerald eyes had fogged up, before Seifer had simply grabbed him like he had been afraid that Squall would suddenly disappear from the face of the earth. Squall wasn't quite sure what to think of this uncalled-for intimacy, but he was certainly feeling awfully flustered.

"S-Seifer... Hey... Uhh..."

Odd as it would be, he received no reaction. Unsure, he started to glance across Seifer's broad shoulder, darting helpless looks around the room.

'_What am I doing? I mean, why am I letting **him** do this? What's wrong with him all of a sudden, anyway... this doesn't seem like him. He's holding on to me so damn tight, I can hardly breathe. Uh. He seems... worried...? But why?'_

Confused, Squall tried to catch a glimpse of Seifer's face. The blond had his eyes shut almost violently, and his jaw was set tightly. Something painful seemed to haunt him, but what could it possibly be? The formerly so easy going, light-hearted guy seemed unusually upset.

"Seifer?" Squall murmured, his voice uncharacteristically gentle. "Are you alright?"

Finally, he perceived movement from the blond who was engulfing him so dearly. Seifer eased away from him just slightly, allowing him to free his arms and move them - together with the clothes - to his sides. Squall heard the blond coughing deep in his chest, as if in embarrassment.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Seifer assured him curtly. "Sorry."

Squall said nothing, nor did he free himself from the blond's hold, but his eyes searched Seifer's handsome face, studying it attentively. When the blond noticed his curious gaze, he forced an expressionless smirk upon his lips and took a step back to separate their bodies completely.

Something had just happened between them - something that hadn't been there before - but neither of them was entirely sure what.

'_I'm acting like a child,' _Seifer scolded himself._ 'What happened just now? His eyes... that look he gave me when he said it was all his fault... I felt like I was gonna die if I didn't hold him right then... like I was never going to be happy ever again. How ridiculous. Don't tell me I'm falling in love with him or some sentimental bullshit like that... Sure, he's cute and all, but fuck... I don't even **believe** in love, and I'm pretty sure he doesn't either. I mean, I know I want him, but that doesn't exactly explain why my heart hurts like hell when I look at him... or when he's looking at **me** like he is right now.'_

Squall's eyes were gleaming at him, and he looked confused, but nonetheless unyielding. There was a streak of concern, too... concern over Seifer's disheveled state, no matter how earnestly Squall tried to squash the notion. They stared at each other silently, and at that point, both of them seemed at a loss over what to do next.

Eventually, Seifer managed to regain his composure and light, if shallow nature. Grinning more genuinely now, he scratched the back of his head and pointed at the door that lead to the master bathroom.

"Ahh... Anyway, princess, you better go take your shower before I throw you down on the bed and think of better ways to get you wet."

If anything managed to snare Squall's undivided attention, that comment and Seifer's provocative wink did. After letting out a stifled, outraged gasp, it took him less than two seconds to squeeze past Seifer and flee into the bathroom, where he quickly slammed the door shut behind himself. He thought that he could hear Seifer snickering outside, but his heart was beating too loudly to tell for sure.

'_... Jesus, get a fucking hold of yourself. He was just fucking with you.'_

Despite his earnest resolution, he couldn't help but blush a furious shade of red at the vivid memory of Seifer's hug and raunchy words. It made him angry and it scared him, but somewhere deep within, he was somewhat touched by the blond's actions. Seifer had shown vulnerability back there; he had clung to him as if he was the only reason worth living or dying for.

Groaning, Squall dumped his forehead into his hand.

'_What am I thinking? This is pathetic. He's just horny, that's all. I've gotta stop reading so much into everything he does. Seriously. What do I even care? I should hurry up so I can go home... It's about time I get out of here.'_

Gathering whatever bits of his sanity that he could find within himself, Squall heaved a guttural sigh and dropped his clothes upon the shut toilet seat. He stood motionless for a while, uncertain of what to do next, before he reached inside the pocket of his jeans to retrieve a silver, lion-shaped pendant that was his most precious possession of all. He had worn it around his neck yesterday, like every day, at least until he had made the decision to carve his skin for blood that night. For some reason, he always removed the necklace before he performed that painful act, as if he was afraid that his mother and Ellone would be able to see through the very eyes of that lion that they had given him as a keepsake.

'_... Don't be stupid.'_

He fastened the chain around his neck quietly, feeling a little more peaceful when the cold streak of silver fell smoothly against his bare skin. Then, he noticed the white bandages which coiled around his wrists, and his features inevitably slanted into a frown.

'_I guess I should take these off.'_

Mechanically, he removed the metal clips and unwrapped the rough gauze strips, only to reveal his tortured, sliced up skin. It had bruised slightly, but neither that nor the dried up, jagged lines of blood did so much as faze Squall. He studied his delicate wrists neutrally, as if they weren't even a part of him, before dropping them to his sides carelessly and placing the used bandages upon the sink.

He turned on the water in the shower and waited for it to become warm, before he grabbed a random towel from Seifer's bathroom closet and stepped out of his boxer shorts. For a short moment, he paused at his reflection in the mirror, wondering just what it was that Seifer was seeing when he looked at him. Squall himself could not see past the dull grey eyes, the always out-of-control hair and the bluish shadows beneath his skin that were testimony to his anemia and lack of sleep.

There wasn't one part about himself that he considered even remotely beautiful.

'_Why are you thinking about this? What does it **matter**? Whatever Seifer is seeing, **if** he's seeing anything at all... it's not real. He'll realize that soon enough.'_

Defiantly whisking his head away, he finally climbed into the shower and drew the dark blue curtain shut behind himself. The hot gush of water that immediately beat down upon his thin frame felt unimaginably good; for a long time, Squall merely stood there, drowning in the soothing sound and caress of a simple, suburban waterfall.

Eventually, however, even the fleeting comfort that was dispensed by the warmth of the water slowly drained away, yanking Squall back into reality even though he would have much rather lingered forever in that state of dreamy stupor. The brunette loved taking showers, even full baths from time to time; at home, the only place nobody ever bothered him was the bathroom.

The only place.

Ever.

'_One of these days, I'm sure even **that's** going to change.'_

Chasing the thought away almost frightfully, Squall swiftly channeled his focus onto something else. He used his slippery fingers to grab a bottle of shampoo off a small, metal rack that Seifer had attached to his showerhead. When Squall studied the label, he couldn't help but wonder.

''_Cinnamon Apple'? That's the shampoo Mom's been buying ever since I was a kid. Hn. Doesn't seem like Seifer, somehow. Then again, it doesn't look like he's actually ever used it.'_

Shrugging, he squirted a small, reddish glob into his hands and set the bottle back on the shelf. He winced as hot water beat onto his raw skin when he turned his wrists over, but before so much as an anguished moan could have escaped his lips, he had ground his teeth together and swallowed the pain. Unperturbed, he lathered his hair and rubbed it thoroughly until he was enveloped by that delicious smell that always propelled him back into his childhood – to the brighter days, anyway.

'_... I'll make it better. I'll make it better than it was back then... better than it is now. I don't care what it takes.'_

He rinsed the shampoo stoically, smoothed the wet tresses of hair out of his face and searched the metal rack for some body wash. Seifer possessed a wide array of soaps and shampoos – he was almost like a girl that way. In fact, Squall thought, his mother's special corner in her bathroom didn't look much different.

He smiled weakly at the thought.

Sighing, he selected a random bottle with a navy blue label that read "Ocean Surf".

"Yoohoo, princess, I need some shampoo!"

Squall started at the unexpected voice that had ruptured the silence from the other side of the shower curtain, and in his surprise, he actually managed to drop the body wash to the bottom of the shower basin, where it bounced, struck three of his toes and finally landed with a wet clunk.

"Ungh!"

He clamped his teeth down upon his bottom lip as he tried not to yelp or place too much weight on his aching foot. His eyes were burning with anger as he glared down upon the offensive object, willing it to evaporate into a myriad of plastic shreds.

'_Son of a bitch__, that hurt!'_

"Uhm, you alright in there? Don't tell me you just dropped the soap?"

Squall acknowledged the suggestive, kinky undertone to Seifer's voice with a pissed off growl. Frowning, he quickly bent down to pick up the "Ocean Surf" bottle, and he did so without letting the edges of the shower curtain out of sight for even a second. Chances were, Seifer _would _barge in on him without even giving the concept of privacy a second thought.

"No, jackass, I didn't," the brunette finally snapped.

"Aw. That's just too bad. Right... can I have some shampoo, then?"

On the other side of the shower, Seifer was snickering softly. He had haphazardly cleaned the other bathroom, only to come to realize that he had an ample supply of shaving utensils and body wash, but no shampoo to clean his precious, golden locks.

Well - not that he minded any excuse for a chance to perhaps catch a glimpse of Squall buck naked and soaking wet.

Unfortunately, Squall thrust merely his arm past the shower curtain, clutching the bottle of shampoo that Seifer had purchased at a local drugstore the day before, for very obvious and perhaps even slightly pathetic reasons.

'_Cinnamon Apple... that's right. Hmm. Wonder if he noticed?'_

"Thanks, princess," Seifer purred provocatively, if only to elicit an irritated snort from his brunette guest.

Grinning, he stretched out his hand to take the shampoo from Squall, but the smug expression faded from his lips quickly when his eyes fell on the dark haired boy's bare wrists that were littered with cuts, bruises and scars. They looked nothing short of horrifying, and painful at that, causing Seifer to frown with whole hearted disapproval.

"How are your wrists feeling?" he asked calmly, tilting Squall's arm around by the elbow to take a better survey of the damage.

"... Fine," came the frayed response from the other side of the curtain as Squall swiftly freed his limb from Seifer's loose hold. "Do you want the shampoo or not?"

"... Yeah."

Seifer took it from him and watched how Squall's arm retracted and ultimately disappeared again. He stared at the empty stretch of air that it had left behind, entrapped in his reveries until he heard Squall sighing impatiently even through the pounding of the water.

"Anything else?"

"No," Seifer replied thoughtfully, but before he turned around, his eyes came alight with a sort of grim determination. "I'll fix up your bandages when you're done."

"Whatever."

"'Kay, well... I'll be in the other bathroom if you happen to need me for anything – like scrubbing your back, for instance. I'll be happy to get all those hard to reach bits for you."

"Over my dead body."

"Hm? Say what? 'With my naked body'? Sure, that can be arranged, sweet pea."

"Take a fucking hike, Almasy."

Squall was staring at the white tiles before him as he listened to Seifer laughing and ultimately taking his leave. For some strange reason, he had started to tremble despite the steady heat of the water and the steam that engulfed him like a cocoon. Shivering, he tried to rub away the goose bumps that were spreading across his upper arms.

'_Fuck, what am I doing? Why am I here? I haven't spent a night at anyone's place ever since I was a kid... and now this. I'm taking a goddamn shower at his place! Do I really trust him that much? Why? Who knows what he's after. He could just be mind fucking me here... he's probably just making fun of me and I don't even realize it. I mean, what other reason could he have to act like this? He can't seriously **like** me. Why would he? No one else does, after all... not that I care, anyway. Ungh. I don't know... I don't know anything... Why do I feel so fucking confused? I had everything under perfect control before I met him, and now I don't understand anything anymore...'_

Willing himself to relax, Squall ran his hand across his closed eyes and sucked in a wet lungful of air. He didn't know what to think anymore, and he was too scared to believe that Seifer's friendliness might just be genuine; sadly, Squall suspected evil, ulterior motives behind every kind act and word.

On the other hand, though he didn't trust Seifer by any stretch of the imagination, the more he got to know him, the less he started to believe that the blond was merely playing games with him.

Unfortunately, that thought didn't do much to reassure him, either.

'_... Stop brooding on this. Finish your shower, get dressed and go the hell home. At least then you won't have to deal with him on your own anymore.'_

Still, the blond's bright laughter was ringing in his ears even after he had finished and stepped out of the shower, wrapped loosely in a dark blue flannel towel. He couldn't hear anything that went on beyond the bathroom walls, but he thought it safe to assume that Seifer was already finished with his shower; after all, Squall had spent a good amount of time conducting directionless inner monologues and trying to glare the faucet jack to pieces.

Sighing, he slung the towel around his hips and stepped up to the sink. The face that looked back at him from the mirror of the medicine cabinet was stark and dominated by dark, lifeless eyes. Haphazardly, he swept the damp tresses of hair behind his ears, not minding what his "do" would look like once it dried. He had never cared much about appearances – neither his own nor that of anybody else.

Even so... Seifer Almasy _did_ intrigue him in more ways than Squall deemed appropriate. He truly had to hand it to the blond – Seifer was exceptionally good looking. Never in his lifetime would Squall have thought that someone like Seifer could possibly be interested in him, especially after their hateful first meeting. Something in Seifer's sharp, intense green eyes had caught Squall's attention that day, even if he had put all of his energy into denying it.

The memory caused Squall to flush crimson once more and he whisked his head away from the mirror.

'_And ever since **when** have I been attracted to guys? Since when have I been attracted to **anybody**, for that fucking matter? Why'd I kiss him? I'm such a fucking idiot. What am I getting myself into? That guy has caused me nothing but trouble so far... that dumb, cocky, thick-headed moron.'_

Grunting irritably, Squall finished toweling himself off and quickly started to get dressed. Putting on his socks, shorts and pants wasn't a big deal, actually forcing himself to slip into the red, long-sleeved shirt that Seifer had lent him was a whole different story, though. Squall honestly loathed the color red, even though (or perhaps _because_) the blood that slicked his skin so frequently was of the same mesmerizing tint. The fact that Seifer had picked out one of his _football_ team shirts of all things didn't exactly help this feeling of repulsion, but Squall wasn't one to complain. So what if he was running around with an image of the Balamb High School "Falcons" mascot etched onto his back?

He had far more important things to concern himself with.

He rolled up the sleeves, which were slightly too long for his arms, and gargled with Seifer's mouthwash once more, before carefully straightening out any mess that he could possibly leave behind. He wasn't entirely sure what to do with his used bandages; hence, he simply grabbed them and rolled them up as neatly as he could, before placing them back onto the sink.

Suddenly, he paused.

"... Damn it."

'_I should just bandage my wrists myself. I don't need him! Bastard. I feel like he's babysitting me. It's really not like my wounds are any of **his** business, anyway. Asshole. Then again... I guess he's done a much better job at taking care of them than I have... I wonder how he knows so much about first aid? Well, whatever the reason, I'm certainly not going to ask.'_

Shrugging coolly, he finally managed to gather enough confidence to leave the bandages be and slowly push the bathroom door ajar. To his mild surprise, he found the bedroom to be quite empty and the bed already made, but there was definite noise coming from the direction of the kitchen.

"Yo, princess. I was about to check whether you'd fallen into the toilet or something."

A curt, impatient sigh escaped Squall's throat as he slowly proceeded towards the living-room and the kitchen. Seifer seemed to be rummaging around behind the counters and only the top of his head was visible, which caused Squall to stop and look around unsurely.

Seifer's spacious one bedroom apartment really was quite nice – his furniture certainly looked like it had cost a fortune - though the blond didn't exactly seem to put much effort into keeping it in a neat condition. His couch was piled high with bulging, colorful bags, of which Squall could only guess the content. Plastic cups, empty beer bottles, spare change and take-out trash from McDonald's littered a low, glass-top coffee table. Some stylish carpets graced the expensive hard wood floor, but there wasn't a single picture that hung on the walls.

'_I'm surprised he doesn't have a bunch of stupid posters of football players or playboy models... or even flaming red pick up trucks, for that matter. I guess his parents still live in Balamb, so why doesn't he have any pictures of **them**, either? Whatever. What do I care.'_

"Hey, Squall, don't go near the kitchen table," Seifer's muffled voice suddenly commanded, before the blond finally re-emerged with a brush and dust pan in his hand. "Wouldn't want ya to tear your feet open."

"... What?"

"There's glass everywhere."

When he watched Seifer moving around the table, clumsily sweeping up shards of glass in various sizes, Squall vaguely recalled being the cause for that mess – a realization which, of course, caused him to frown in shame.

"Sorry," the brunette muttered contritely.

"Sorry? For what? Don't be stupid."

The blond looked up at him from his squatting position on the floor, and Squall noticed that he had already shaved and gelled back his hair. Seifer was dressed in some khaki shorts, untied sneakers and an olive green, long-sleeved shirt that accentuated his nicely muscled torso and the enticing color of his eyes. He looked hot, and every guy in the room was fully aware of it.

'_Damn him.'_

Seifer grinned as he watched Squall's face souring; it was quite the cute sight, really. The brunette looked adorable in his red football shirt, though it_ was_ much too large for his slender statue. Squall had pushed his sleeves up to his elbows and was now crossing his arms in front of his chest, which, upon seeing his bare wrists, reminded Seifer of his other task that still required attention.

"Hey, watch your injuries," he chided gently as he stood up, assured that he had swept up all of the glass on the floor and table. "Grab a chair, I'll be right back with some fresh bandages."

While Seifer dumped his trash, Squall approached the table with indecisive steps. He took a chair and spun it around, lowering himself on the cushioned seat mechanically. Out of the corner of his eyes, he glanced at the smooth tabletop, remembering awfully well how Seifer had lifted him up and sat him down right there the night before, had _laid_ him down, and...

For the fifth time that day, Squall's pale face flushed crimson.

'_How fucking pathetic... stop fantasizing about it already! What are you, a virgin? A little school girl with a crush on the class jock? Pull. Yourself. Together!'_

He cleared his throat nervously as he shot aimless looks around the room, suddenly noticing the faint smell of coffee in the air. His nose crinkled slightly at the impression; his mother was a downright caffeine addict, always on the prowl for new flavors and roasts of her chosen "poison". At some point, she had dreamt of opening up her own little coffee shop, with home made pies, muffins and the largest selection of coffee one would ever find anywhere, but that dream had vanished just like most of her other ones had.

As always, Squall could feel guilt welling up inside him, filling his heart and mind with darkness.

'_If it wasn't for me...'_

"Yo. Stop that! It's too early in the morning to be frowning like that, princess."

He looked up, startled, gazing into a pair of striking peridot colored eyes that were fixed upon him thoughtfully. Seifer had sat down in a chair before him, bandages and Bactine resting in his lap. Squall didn't stop frowning, but the shadows that were plaguing his soul had become a little more translucent.

"Stop calling me that," the younger male finally bit, his tone challenging and cold.

"Calling you what?" Seifer asked with a kink of his eyebrow. "Princess?"

Squall nodded curtly before veering his head aside, scowling. The nickname had always bothered him, why, he couldn't even say. He usually cared little about other people's opinions, but the fact that Seifer addressed him by this loathed name made his insides churn.

"Well, what else shall I call ya then, your grace?"

"I have a name, dumbass."

Seifer's lips curved upwards, but this time, the smile didn't reach his eyes.

"So do I."

Whether he liked it or not, Squall had to admit that Seifer had made a valid point there, and he found himself deprived of any further snappy comebacks. Instead, he had started to think. Squall had called the blond who was sitting before him "idiot" and "dumbass" more often than by his real name, but quite honestly, he was simply scared of letting this whole... _thing_ become too personal.

Then again, they had made out on Seifer's fucking kitchen table, how much more _personal_ could they possibly get?

Sighing in defeat, Squall lowered his gaze to his kneecaps.

"Whatever."

To his surprise, Seifer said nothing, but instead reached for one of his wrists. Instinct urged Squall to yank it back, but he managed to hold still, if only because Seifer raised his voice to a smooth crawl.

"Lemme see your wrists, please... Squall."

There wasn't even a hint of sarcasm that tainted Seifer's tone when he spoke; in fact, Squall couldn't remember ever liking the sound of his own name as much as he did that very moment in Seifer's kitchen, on that cursed, awkward Saturday morning.

Wordlessly, he extended his arms.

Seifer moved close enough to where he could rest Squall's wrists on his thighs. Of course, he could have tended to them on top of the table, but he cherished each second of bodily contact that they shared, no matter how chaste or fleeting it might have been. That strange, warm, pulsing feeling returned to his heart whenever they touched one another, causing his chest to tighten and a huge lump to fill up his throat.

'_Man... what's going on? I swear I've never felt like this before... not sure how much I like it. Maybe I should just fuck him and get it over with already. Ugh. Yeah fuckin' right. There's no way I could do that. I bet this sounds really damn corny, but I don't wanna... hurt him... not if I can help it, anyway. I like it when he's relaxed like he is now. He's usually so damn tense, like he's got a fuckin' stick up his ass. I think he's starting to loosen up though, at least a little. Holy shit. I sure am getting soft these days, huh? Just when did I start caring about anyone's feelings but my own, anyway?'_

Chuckling mutely to himself, Seifer swiped Squall's wounds with the Bactine solution, covered them with gauze pads and finally wrapped them up as professionally as he could manage. All the while, Squall was studying each of his movements very attentively, though not without pretending to be poise itself. The brunette's eyes scanned Seifer's sinewy hands, noting with faint interest how they were larger and distinctly more tanned than his own. They looked strong... _too_ strong... capable of doing cruel, painful things. Nonetheless, Seifer seemed to know well how to utilize them in a careful, gentle manner, and quietly, Squall thanked him for that.

"I made some coffee," Seifer murmured under his breath, not looking up. "I'll have to run down to the bakery around the corner and grab some bagels for breakfast, though. Don't have jack in the fridge. You like bagels, right?"

Squall grimaced as he was suddenly reminded of the conversation he had held with his mother the night before. He hadn't told Seifer about this, but she had asked him to bring his new friend over for breakfast. After all, Squall hadn't slept over at anyone's house ever since elementary school, so this was an event worthy of celebration.

"My mom..." the brunette started reluctantly, a crack to his voice when he suddenly felt Seifer's eyes on himself. "She... uh... wants you to come over for breakfast. I guess she figured you'd drop me off at home and hang out for a while."

He shrugged, even though Seifer was still holding on to his arms. Finally, he met the blond's gaze, and he flinched noticeably at the odd, sparking interest that was smoldering in those jade green orbs.

"Really..." Seifer said, his voice low and husky. "That's pretty damn nice of her."

"I guess," Squall agreed gruffly.

"Too bad _you_'d rather see me dead than at your place."

Squall blinked, honestly dumbfounded at that remark. His forehead creased into wrinkles when Seifer stood up almost abruptly, causing his chair to topple back and forth. Then, Seifer placed his first aid supplies on the table, distanced himself from his brunette guest and opened up a seemingly random kitchen cabinet.

Back at the table, Squall thought his head was about to explode.

'_... What? The hell? What'd he just say? That I'd rather see him dead than at my place...? What the fuck? That's not...'_

"I never said that," the dark haired teen finally murmured, while chewing on the corner of his bottom lip.

Seifer peeked at him from behind the open cabinet, both sneering and smiling at the same time. His eyes were glowing virulent green like those of a wild animal.

"Nah, but you thought it."

The remark had been light, careless and almost too easy to ignore, but Squall's face darkened nonetheless. He felt sudden, overwhelming anger charring his insides to hot ash, though he wasn't entirely sure where this unexpected fury had erupted from.

Apparently, Seifer had discovered some fool-proof method of stirring the most intense of feelings from the frigid brunette, and Squall found himself hating the blond for it.

"Don't flatter yourself into believing that you know what I'm thinking," he snapped icily, weighing each of his words down with arrogance. "Because you don't. You don't know a damn thing about me."

"Oh, aren't _we_ catty this morning, eh?" Seifer retorted smugly. "Meow, kitten."

"Shut the fuck up!"

Squall had catapulted himself out of his chair angrily and retreated to the window to glare down at the parking lot and try to regain his composure. He had no idea why he suddenly felt the urge to punch Seifer to the ground, but he was honestly upset over his words. Of course, Squall's typical behavior would have suggested _exactly_ what Seifer had assumed – that Squall would hate to spend any more time in the older youth's presence than absolutely necessary – but for some unknown reason, which admittedly bugged the hell out of the brunette, Seifer was mistaken.

'_Why am I so angry? Because of what he said? Because he's wrong? Idiot. Who does he think he is? He doesn't know dick about me. Looks like he's not quite as thick-headed as I thought, though. I guess he got the "hint" all along. But... that would mean that he stuck around even though he **knew **well enough that I didn't want him to... But why would he do such a thing? What is he, masochistic? Must be. Why do I even care? And why the fuck would I rather have him come along to my house than not? What's wrong with me all of a sudden? This isn't making any sense.'_

He pinched the back of his nose in aggravation, his eyes shut as tightly as possible, and he didn't stir until he suddenly felt a hand placed flat upon his left shoulder. Frustrated, he spun around, but before he could have uttered so much as a single word or curse, he already found himself silenced by a pair of lips that were forced hard onto his own. Seifer was kissing him almost violently, pinning him up against the wall as he ground their bodies together with long, powerful arms. Squall practically forgot to breathe through his nose at the initial surprise - a fault that left him accordingly winded and panting when Seifer eventually did break their kiss. The blond was still pushing him against the wall, grinning smugly, but Squall didn't even attempt to offer any resistance.

He didn't know what was going on, which of course made him suitably nervous, until Seifer finally decided to shed some light on the situation.

"Fact is," the blond breathed into his ear suggestively, causing Squall to wince at the blazing intensity of those two monosyllables, "I have _no idea_ what you're thinking, Squall Leonhart. None whatsoever. And you know what? I _hate_ it."

He nipped at the nape of Squall's neck, teasing the sensitive flesh with his teeth. For a moment, he felt guilty, because he knew full well that Squall would be intimidated by his offensive approach. To his surprise, though, the brunette merely growled deep in his throat and pitched his head into his neck, trying to writhe out of reach.

"Then quit with the assumptions... jackass," Squall hissed hoarsely, his blue eyes slit and nailed to the ceiling as he spoke. "Because you're not very good at it."

The blond snorted softly in reply and ghosted Squall's exposed jugular with another kiss, before venturing upwards along his jaw line and burning his violent green gaze into the brunette's.

"Alright then..." he whispered, kindness seeping back into his voice. "What's for breakfast, kitten?"

Squall laced his brows together at the new nickname, which elicited a lascivious grin and a playful wink from Seifer's end. The smaller brunette sighed evasively. It was difficult for him to keep a clear head when he was being held like this, but when he finally _did_ manage to come to his senses, he snaked out of Seifer's embrace with impressive ease.

The blond merely smiled at him.

"Pancakes," Squall stated evenly, a vague grin playing at the corners of his lips as he strode over to the table and sank back into his chair, all of his coolness regained at last. "Best you'll ever have, too."

"Mmmh," Seifer declared impishly, while licking his lips as he stalked Squall's retreating body with his eyes. "Nice."

"Knock it off," the brunette bristled, a strained edge to his voice.

"Knock what off?"

"That... you... whatever you're doing... just quit it."

"Why? Don't tell me you're getting excited?"

"Like hell I am."

Seifer couldn't help but be amused by Squall's obstinate display of frigidness. Apparently, the brunette was still indecisive on what (or _who_) he wanted just yet, but Seifer was certainly planning on rectifying that. This guy wasn't like any other he had met before, and Seifer would rather be damned than waste this unique "opportunity". He wanted the brunette – a feeling that probably went even beyond that raw, physical desire - and so he would have him, no matter what it took. That was the attitude he had been raised with and he saw nothing wrong with it. He was an Almasy – one way or another, he always got what he wanted.

For Seifer, it was as plain and simple as that.

Little did he know that for Squall, life hadn't been "simple" in almost eighteen years.

"Want some coffee?" Seifer asked eventually, pointing at two steaming cups sitting aloof on the kitchen counter.

"... Yeah."

The blond took both mugs in one hand, nonchalantly setting one down before Squall and one in front of himself. With a muffled snort of laughter, he noticed how Squall was staring at the light brown swirls of liquid in obvious mistrust, before raising the cup to his pale, ruby colored lips and taking a small, hesitant sip.

About a split second later, the brunette's pretty features twisted into a mask of pure, unconcealed disgust and he started to gag hoarsely.

"What the _fuck_...!"

Laughing from the very bottom of his heart now, Seifer had trouble not spewing his own mouthful of coffee all over the kitchen table. Of course, Squall was glaring bloody daggers at him, his dark blue eyes sharp and narrow with anger.

"What the hell _is_ this?"

"It's called _coffee_," the blond elaborated, before bursting into another fit of uncontrollable laughter over his friend's twitching features.

Squall wanted to throw something at him.

"It's fucking _gross_," he bit tartly. "Stop laughing, you jackass! This isn't funny."

"Oh, but it is," Seifer replied, waving his hand through the air as he kept chortling.

For the life of him, he just couldn't pull himself together.

"It's just a little milk and sugar, silly," he lilted, his eyes sparking as he sipped on his drink. "No reason to make such a face."

"_A little_ my ass! Are you outta your fucking mind? Do you want me to die of a sugar shock, or what?"

This time, Seifer _did_ snort a spray of overly sweetened, hazelnut flavored coffee in Squall's general direction, only barely managing to spare the brunette's furious face. At that point, the dark haired youth looked about ready to simply murder Seifer with his perfect, snobbish, silver teaspoon.

"No," Seifer replied eventually, the word bubbly and suggestive as he wiped his mouth with his sleeve and waggled his eyebrows. "I just thought you could use something hot and sweet down your throat, ya know what I mean?"

That comment caused Squall to give another angry hiss and snap his head to the side sharply. He looked downright livid as he stirred around in his cup, every line in his face tight and grim. With each time that his spoon clunk against the china of the cup, his brows slid a little lower over his eyes and the knuckles of his hands turned a little whiter.

What _had_ he gotten himself into?

"Stupid ass," he finally snarled cynically.

Chuckling in amusement, Seifer pushed himself out of his chair, though not without ruffling the younger boy's still slightly damp, chocolate brown tresses playfully.

"Stupid ass, huh? So cute."

Squall furiously swiped out at his hand in response, swatting it away like an overly annoying insect. His blond host grinned amicably at that reaction, before retreating to one of his cupboards once more.

"Don't talk to me like I'm a girl or a fucking child," Squall caterwauled acidly, while crossing his arms in front of his chest. "I'm not."

Seifer smiled at him more kindly this time. He had retrieved another mug and was pouring coffee into it now – black... no sugar, no milk. For some reason, he had known all along that Squall wouldn't drink it any other way, but the temptation of messing with him had been too hard to resist.

"I know that," he replied complacently as he placed the cup on the table and sat down again.

When Squall grabbed his cup, Seifer suddenly leaned into him without warning, his angular face with the trademark, mischievous smirk only inches from the brunette's. Squall immediately edged back in his seat as far as he could, his grasp around his mug tight as his features went blank.

"Eh-"

Seifer tilted his head to the side, winking.

"I'd be downright _devastated_ if you were a kid!" he exclaimed blithely, before bringing one finger to his mouth in thought. "Then again, you're not exactly _legal_ as it is. When ya turning 18 again, cupcake?"

"Fuck off."

"Hahaha... I swear, you wouldn't know humor if it smacked you square on the ass, kid."

Seifer ran his hand through Squall's hair yet again, more softly this time and with a blinding smile on his lips. For some odd reason, the brunette's longish, chunky tresses always reminded him of pure, liquid chocolate and he found himself liking that comparison very much. Not that chocolate had ever been amongst his favorite kinds of food, but perhaps it was time for a change or two...

Squall, however, didn't seem _quite_ as happy over the blond's fond caress. Sulking, he no longer even bothered to swat Seifer's hand away, but instead funneled all his energies into looking like the impersonification of a sitting menace.

'_Bastard. Why does he always try to fuck with me? How annoying. How old is he, twelve?'_

Both scowling and pouting at the same time, Squall skidded away from Seifer to the other end of the table. There, he stubbornly took a much too large gulp of his drink, which was still very warm, and it immediately scorched his sensitive throat. Screwing up his face at the white hot pain, Squall coughed hoarsely into the hollow of his right hand, fighting for his breath until he felt someone slapping his back mercifully and a deep voice was droning in his ears.

"Idiot... No one chugs hot coffee like that."

He wanted to give some sort of snide reply to Seifer's words, but his throat hurt too much to hold any sound. Hence, he simply sat there, his unfocused gaze scanning across the cherry wood table before him as he tried to keep a straight face, although he was still coughing rather cutely every now and then. The blond who was standing by his side seemed to be smiling again, but Squall ignored him with a persistence that had begun to border to obsession.

They continued to drink their coffee in silence, only interrupted by Shiva demanding her breakfast from her master. Seifer willingly complied with her request, and he was fully aware of Squall's subtle look-over as he left the table to bend down and fill his dog's bowl with dry kibbles, while lovingly scratching her ears.

Indeed – Squall _was_ studying him with thinly veiled interest from behind the brim of his cup, his half-lidded eyes dark and intense like the coffee he was sipping on.

'_... I just can't figure him out. First he's being a downright jerk, then he acts all... sweet and what not. He's been like this ever since I met him. I hate it. Why can't he just be one way or another? He's confusing me. I never know what to think when I'm around him. I'd bet he's doing this shit on purpose.'_

When Seifer sat back down, Squall cocked his head into his neck to take in the last of his drink. As he placed his cup on the table, his attention strayed to the white strips of gauze that enveloped his wrists, and he continued to stare at them empty-eyed until the boy next to him cleared his throat rather noisily.

"Where are your wristbands, anyway?"

Squall flicked up his gaze to meet Seifer's, who was still finishing his coffee. For a moment, the brunette had to think on that question, until he recalled cutting himself amidst that secluded group of trees at the park. The memory was a bit vague now, but he _did _remember that he had been crying – something that he usually refrained from doing, because it did nothing to ease the pain or solve his problems. Why exactly he had cracked this time, he didn't quite know, but apparently he had left his wristbands somewhere by those trees when he had staggered over to the playground.

'_The playground... if Rinoa hadn't been stupid enough to climb all over the jungle gym like a drunken monkey, I doubt Seifer would have ever found out about this. It's all her fault then, huh? Whatever. I guess as long as he doesn't ask too many nosy questions, it's not that big of a deal. I mean, he's bound to lose interest in this whole thing sooner or later...'_

Squall didn't really approve of the feeling, but there was a strange sort of sadness that constricted his throat at the thought. A small part of him was thankful that Seifer had found him out there in the darkness, but he wasn't foolish enough to believe that the blond would stick around for very long.

In any case, it probably wouldn't be very healthy for either of them.

"... I lost them," he answered, his voice barely above the barren level of monotony.

"You _lost_ them?"

"At the park."

"Oh," Seifer replied, sounding a bit dumbfounded. "I see. Well, anyway, with those sleeves you shouldn't have any problems keeping the bandages hidden."

"Yeah. I guess..."

As if Seifer had given Squall a cue, the brunette slowly tugged at his sleeve cuffs and pulled them over his forearms. Seifer watched him neutrally, smiling on the inside at how very much too slender Squall was for that particular shirt of his. He was seemingly drowning in it, looking almost like a girl that had snatched away some of her boyfriend's attire.

Well, regardless of the appearance of the situation... Squall _wasn't_ a girl, and Seifer felt nowhere near "boyfriend" status (which by no means is to imply that he held no aspirations). For the time being, however, the blond was simply relieved that Squall was neither glaring him to shreds nor denying his mere presence.

Somewhere along the way, Seifer had learned how to be humble in his demands.

"What time is it?"

He looked up at Squall's question, then glanced at the stainless steel watch he was wearing.

"Almost ten," he replied, while turning his wrist so Squall could look at it as well. "Think your mom's waiting?"

"Yeah," Squall drawled reluctantly. "Probably."

"Alright, lemme finish my coffee and then we can take off."

"Okay."

Seifer downed his lukewarm coffee in one gulp and stood up with a satisfied groan, surprised to see Squall following his example immediately. The brunette had grabbed his own cup and was getting ready to drop it off in the kitchen, but suddenly, he halted in his steps and gazed down at the floor as if he expected to find something of great interest on the white and cream marbled tiles.

"Hey. What's the matter, kitten?"

Squall reluctantly raised his head to meet Seifer's curious looks. His face soured at the cutesy nickname and the prospect of having to explain himself, but he managed to shrug in a manner that was so careless, nobody would have ever guessed how he really felt on the inside.

"The cutter..." he started, noting how Seifer's features hardened slightly. "Where is it?"

"Why are you asking?"

Frankly, Squall didn't like the sound of that question. What business was his cutter to Seifer in the first place? After all, it didn't belong to the ornery blond; he had no right to even _ask_ why Squall was searching for it.

"It's _mine_," Squall replied evenly, but a subtle note of warning had slipped into his tone. "I want it back."

"What for?"

Squall ground his teeth together in response.

'_... Nosy piece of shit.'_

"What do you care?" he bit.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me."

Seifer's voice had become sharp, causing Squall to swallow the snide remark that had been lingering on his tongue. He shoved his free hand into the pocket of his jeans and turned his head aside evasively. Who did Seifer think he was, anyway? His bodyguard? His loyal knight? How pathetic. Squall didn't need the blond's protection, much less did he _want_ it. If he wanted to slash his wrists then that was _his_ choice and his alone.

"You really don't get it, do you?" Seifer suddenly asked, cold bitterness and anger swaying the words in a way that caused Squall to look at him from the corner of his eyes. "Did you listen to _anything_ I said last night? Huh? Apparently not, or else you wouldn't be asking stupid questions like that. I hate to see you bleeding like a stuck pig, idiot, _that's_ why I got rid of the goddamn cutter. I tossed it, alright? Because I don't want you getting any funny ideas. Because I _like_ you. But if you want the damn thing that badly, I guess I can root through the fuckin' trash and get it for you."

Seifer whipped around harshly and proceeded towards the trash can with swift, furious steps, but to his honest surprise, Squall called out to stop him.

"Wait."

Sighing, Seifer looked over his shoulder as he set his mug down upon the counter more roughly than he had originally planned to.

"_What_, Squall?" he asked, his voice grating with strain as he suddenly became awfully aware of the fact that his patience was starting to run dangerously thin.

"Forget the cutter," Squall answered calmly, slicing the air with his hand. "I don't want it, alright? I don't care. Let's just get going."

With that, Squall pushed through the kitchen, placed his cup in the sink and disappeared in the bedroom without saying another word. On the inside though, he was bubbling over with thoughts and feelings. Frankly, Seifer's outburst had shocked him and affected him in more ways than he really liked to admit. It wasn't even so much _what_ Seifer had said, but the way in which he had said it.

Well... perhaps it was a little bit of both.

_..: "Because I like you." :.._

Shaking his head, Squall grabbed his boots and sat down on the bed to put them on. The lines of his face were firmer than usual, and his lips thinned a little more with each time that he yanked on his shoelaces.

'_Goddamn bastard. Why does he always have to say shit like that? I can't stand him. He's rude, annoying, he meddles in things that are none of his business, he dares to fucking kiss me... and then he says those kinds of... things. It makes me feel like... my heart stopped beating... and I don't know why! I've never cared whether anyone liked me or not... In fact, if it was up to me, nobody would ever say another damn word to me ever again! And yet I'm here, I've **been** here all night, sleeping in one **bed** with him and what not... So what am I? Just another hypocrite?'_

_..: "Because I like you." :.._

'_Shut up! Shut the fuck up! I don't wanna hear it, okay!'_

"Squall, are you trying to strangle your ankles or what?"

Not until that moment did Squall notice that he had been pulling on his laces so hard that they had cut into his fingers, right through his skin and down to his very blood.

Now that he thought about it, it stung quite a bit.

Sighing, he let go of the black strings and gazed upon the insides of his hands as he rested them on top of his thighs, dropping his head so low that his chin was almost touching his collarbone.

'_What am I doing...'_

Blood was snaking into the creases of his right hand fingers in very fine, languid trails. His left hand was alright, probably due to its lack in strength.

Somehow, it was hurting either way.

"Idiot."

Past the outlines of the dark brown bangs that were falling into his eyes, Squall suddenly noticed Seifer, who had called out to him just seconds ago. The blond was kneeling before him, his face dominated by a disapproving frown. He took Squall's hands, who surrendered them without putting up any sort of fight, and examined them patiently. Despite his seemingly calm exterior, however, Seifer breathed an angry snort.

What was it with this boy, anyway? Did he care about his own health at all? Did he care about _anything_? He looked so... lost. The color of his eyes was a depressing blend of sky blue and fog grey, slicked with a sheen of helplessness as he cowered there on the edge of the bed, avoiding Seifer's direct gaze.

'_I've seen this look on him before... and I don't like it. In fact, I don't like it one damn bit.'_

Squall watched Seifer quietly, an odd feeling of defeat clawing at his chest as he studied the blond's cool, collected façade. Why did Seifer always have to see him in such states of vulnerability? Was he really that weak...? Could he not take care of himself on his own anymore?

'_I think I'm starting to lose it. If I cut myself on shoelaces, then I really-'_

With a sudden start, every thought was bleached from Squall's mind when Seifer took his injured hand into his own and slowly guided it to his mouth. The blond closed his lips around the cuts, gently sucking away the blood that was seeping from them like crimson poison. His green eyes flicked a neutral glance to the owner of said hand, noting with interest the violent blush that had conquered Squall's cheeks.

"W-what the hell are you doing? W-what... _Seifer_! S-stop that!"

Squall was stammering and cringing, trying to reclaim his fingers from Seifer's mouth, but the blond was keeping them with almost ridiculous ease. He stoically continued to clean his brunette classmate's wounds, and he was intrigued by the bitter, metallic taste that now coated his tongue. He was used to the flavor from his countless fist fights and his football history of almost one decade, but the fact that it was _Squall _he was tasting gave this an entirely new twist.

"Shit... Quit it already!" the brunette before him pleaded almost desperately. "That's fucking gross, you-"

"What?" Seifer asked calmly as he licked a cut on Squall's middle finger, grinning cruelly. "Don't worry, my spit won't hurt ya. My parents made me piss in a cup and poked me with needles just about every damn week of my life ever since I hit puberty."

"N-no... I mean..." Squall replied, feeling distinctly uneasy now. "My blood... you really shouldn't... ungh..."

The blond chuckled huskily.

"What's wrong with your blood?"

"Nothing," Squall snapped back with as much ferocity as he could muster, "But still, you-"

"Alright then. Don't worry, my mom did this to me when I was a kid. It's okay. Just relax and it'll be fine."

"B-but..."

It was a kind of torture that Seifer thoroughly enjoyed, especially since Squall seemed all too receptive for it, despite his outward display of embarrassment. The brunette looked nervous, perhaps even a little bit aroused in his own way, but regardless of that, he certainly no longer resembled a lifeless icicle. No matter how many disjointed glances he flicked around the room during this special "treatment", his gaze always returned to Seifer and the hungry glint in his eyes.

"Bastard..." the brunette growled, his voice weak and off pitch.

"Why, you're welcome," Seifer smiled as he gave Squall's palm one final kiss. "There, all better, kiddo. Don't think you'll need any band-aids now, will you?"

Mumbling, Squall pulled back his freed limb, his expression grim. The fiery red on his cheeks had submitted to ivory once more, causing him to look a little more composed. Nonetheless, his heart was racing and jumping in his chest, distributing heat to all the _wrong_ areas of his body. He hated Seifer for making him feel this pathetic, and the hot blooded anger that raged across the surface of his eyes informed the blond quite effectively of the nature of his feelings.

Not that Seifer seemed to mind.

"You ready?" the eighteen year old asked lightly, apparently amused by the fact that he was on the receiving end of a thousand death glares.

The boy on his bed didn't think it was funny at all.

"If you ever... do that again..." he ground out, the words shaking with irritation. "I swear you'll be fucking sorry."

Biting down fiercely upon his lips, a fairly light-headed Squall scrambled onto his feet and strode past Seifer with as much composure as he could possibly come up with. As he escaped from the blond's room, his disappearing steps were echoing more loudly than they should have. Seifer was still kneeling on the floor, an arrogant but loveable smirk tugging on the corners of his mouth as he chuckled quietly to himself, savoring the very last bits of Squall's blood on his tongue.

"... We'll see about that."


	13. Looks Like Heaven, Feels Like Hell

-:-  
**Chapter 13  
Looks Like Heaven, Feels Like Hell**

"_Cry for me."_

-:-

Like your smile and your fingertips

Like the way that you move your lips

I like the cool way you look at me

Everything about you is bringing me

Misery.

_"Buckets of Rain" - Bob Dylan_

-:-

"... So, just when exactly are ya gonna be done taking your stroll down Cranky Lane, huh? I mean, could you just give me a rough estimate or somethin'?"

A sarcastic, husky chuckle escaped Seifer's throat as he cast a quick glance at the dark-haired boy sitting in the passenger seat of his truck. Squall was glowering at some imaginary point on the black plastic surface of the dashboard in front of him, his cold blue eyes zeroed in on it with grim resolve. Seifer had left him be for the greater part of their ride, but now that they were inevitably nearing Squall's home, the blond thought it a good idea to clear up the dark cloud that had been hovering above both of their heads since their departure from Seifer's apartment.

It was safe to say that said dark cloud was more or less to blame on Seifer's very unusual concept of performing first aid on Squall in his bedroom; at least the blond assumed as much, considering that his younger companion hadn't heeded him with anything more than a few gracious glares from hell ever since then. Of course, finding the brunette in a state of perfect silence was far from unusual, but it _was_ slowly starting to grate on Seifer's nerves.

"Man, alright, look-"

The golden-haired eighteen year old drawled a smooth sigh as he hauled ass across the freeway and passed a car on their sharp right in such a rough manner that it flattened Squall against the back of his seat.

Needless to say, Seifer's driving skills (or lack thereof) didn't exactly brighten Squall's sinister mood.

_'Brainless prick. Who the fuck taught him how to drive, anyway? Good grief.'_

"- If you're really _this_ upset over what I did back at my place, I apologize, okay? I was just fuckin' with ya. Had I known it'd be this big a deal, I would've happily kept my mouth shut... or your hand out of it, for that matter."

"... It's not."

Seifer blinked, surprised he'd managed to coax a response from the brunette at all.

"Huh?" he asked. "What do you mean? It's not what? A big deal...?"

"Hn."

Squall had tugged his wrists beneath his arms and breathed those sullen, monotone replies against the slightly tinted window in front of him, all the while scowling as if the world was about to come to a bitter end. Really, Seifer thought, Squall never actually _looked_ like he meant it when he dismissed a matter as "nothing" or "no big deal."

Honestly – why couldn't he just throw one of his hissy fits or something and get it the hell over with already?

'_Just who are you trying to fool, anyway? It's not like I can't tell that you wanna stab me with the next best piece of cutlery you can get your eager little hands on.'_

"Oh, so it ain't, huh?" Seifer thus snorted, his tone suitably sarcastic. "Why, what's with the sour face then, oh pray tell?"

"... Nothing."

"Right... I see... so 'it's not a big deal' and it's 'nothing'," Seifer mocked dryly. "Well, woop-dee-fuckin'-doo. Isn't that just fuckin' great. Be still my beating heart, perhaps I'll even get to hear a full fuckin' sentence from you today! _Damn_."

Seifer growled, frustrated and drained on tolerance for the brunette's cranky, unnerving attitude. Meanwhile, Squall sucked his bottom lip between his teeth and gradually sank as low into his seat as his safety belt would permit. How he hated this. Why on earth couldn't Seifer just keep his stupid mouth shut and leave him alone for five fucking minutes? Why? Was it really _that_ much to ask?

Of course Squall had been upset over the blond's weird ritual of tending to his wounds, but at this point, the memory of it all didn't even so much as faze him anymore. As his forehead crinkled in deep thought, his mind was occupied with far more pressing issues than Seifer mistaking himself for a hormone-driven epiphany of Count Dracula.

'_... What the fuck does he expect me to say, anyway? There's nothing for us to talk about. Everyone's always expecting me to say something, as if I signed some sort of fucking agreement when I was born that I would lay out my feelings before every asshole that has the balls to ask. It's nobody's business what I'm thinking. Seifer's no different – he's exactly like everyone else, always nagging me and pissing me off. I can't believe I'm actually taking him home with me to have breakfast after everything that happened. What a grand idea. I must be out of my fucking mind. Why does Mom want to meet him, anyway? It's not like he's my "buddy" now, just because we... ugh. Whatever. Even if I wanted to be friends with him - which, rest assured, I **don't** - it would simply be a... a bad idea. I don't need a friend, anyway, much less someone like Seifer to piss me off every thirty seconds for the sheer fun of it. And the really messed up thing is, I already know Mom's gonna love him and his stupid jock charm to pieces. I just know it. Fuck. I guess at this point I can only hope that Mom and Ell are the only ones home right now. If not... I... I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do.'_

As Squall was perfectly busy contemplating matters with himself in the unfathomable depths of his own mind, the blond teenager next to him could feel his already wavering patience inevitably falling to bits and pieces.

'_Goddammit, watching grass grow is more interesting than trying to hold a conversation with this guy. Argh. Fuck it, I give up.'_

"You are one stubborn ass little punk, let me tell you," Seifer huffed, a bit more sting to his tone than he had intended, before reaching for the control panel of his radio and pushing a seemingly random string of buttons. "Fine – suit yourself, princess. If you're not gonna talk, I guess I'll just turn on some music."

Squall cringed visibly as the expensive surround sound speakers to his right, left and rear suddenly flared to life in a shockingly noisy fashion. With twitching features and murder flashing in his eyes, the sulking brunette found himself forced to listen to the last, wry chords of some fading rock ballad.

"This station's pretty sweet," Seifer announced, his spirits soaring as he tapped his fingers on the steering wheel in an offbeat rhythm, though he earned nothing but a side-ways death glare from Squall's end. "I listen to it all the time."

'_Do I look like I give a rat's ass? Spare me your fucking editorials, will you?'_

Squall refrained from putting his cynicism into words, if only because the DJ on air (who happened to be "gifted" with an extremely irritating voice) was starting to ramble at a level of volume that made it downright impossible for the brunette to even produce so much as a single, coherent thought.

"**Whaddup, yo, dudes and dudettes? This is 92.6 kilo, your pure ROCK station – and I'm the one and only Johnny G! What ya'all up to this _fine_ Saturday morning, ey?"**

'_... Shove that "fine Saturday morning" shit up where the sun doesn't shine. Asshole.'_

"**I hope ya'all got tickets for our SWEET summer event out by Palmer's Park tonight! It starts at 5pm and ends, erh, whenever the last drunk bitch hits the ground. Hehe, tha's right. In case ya haven't pre-ordered ya tickets, I guess ya can still get a hold of some at the gates, call our ticket hotline or eBay your sorry lives away, but... either way, ya better get them while they're hot! Yeah, baby! Yeah! Whoot!"**

'_Oh my fucking god. Someone show mercy on my brain cells and decapitate this moron.'_

**"Oh yeah! Dude, and get this - my buddy just went to Taiwan and I told the fucker to bring me home some Taiwanese hookers, so maybe I'll actually show up with a date this year! Hah! Go me! Rock on! Hahaha-"**

'_...'_

"Fuck it, that's _enough_!"

"... Eh?"

Seifer blinked in surprise as his formerly silent companion suddenly let out an earsplitting shout and sliced the air between them sharply with his left hand, wearing a most disgusted expression on his face. Judging by his angrily twitching features and the murderous, borderline psychotic glint in his eyes, he looked about ready to hack somebody's sorry head off.

"Turn the shit _off_, alright?" Squall spat through ground teeth, only barely restraining his own irate temper. "It's driving me fucking nuts! I can't stand it! I'll talk about whatever the hell you want! Just... turn it _off_!"

Seifer studied him with newly aroused, meticulous interest, a smug grin playing a ballad entirely of its own on his lips. Squall seemed traumatized by the DJ's concept of teenage coolness and humor – well, frankly, Seifer was, too. The blond did enjoy the "pure rock" station as long as Johnny G wasn't on the mic, but for what the overexcited dork was worth, he did serve as a valuable tool of torture.

When Seifer thumbed the 'off' button of his radio, Squall heaved a subdued, grateful sigh. The dumb, pseudo-cool talk of that nutjob on air had been enough to give him a raging migraine. Listening to the people around him was tedious enough – he certainly had no desire to cling to the words of some wannabe radio star who was sitting miles and miles away, cracking tasteless jokes and making a complete ass of himself.

Thus, the sudden silence that surrounded him felt like his own, private slice of paradise, but to his great misfortune, Seifer was only too happy to remind him of the bargain that he had entered so thoughtlessly.

"Soo," the blond cooed slyly while his eager green eyes were darting heated looks back and forth between the road in front of them and Squall's pained face. "You'll talk about _anything_ I want?"

Squall cringed at the suggestive tone in Seifer's voice.

"... Bite me."

"Ah, you see, I would, but there's a limit to my multi-tasking ability, believe it or not," Seifer declared airily while flapping his hand towards the steering wheel. "Save that thought for later though, 'kay? Don't want the rumors going 'round that Seifer Almasy can't deliver."

Squall groaned in exasperation, but said nothing. Truth be told, it was pointless anyway. No matter how many times he snapped or glared at Seifer, the blond always managed to ridicule his efforts with just one kinky wink or a cocky smirk.

He honestly didn't think he could stand it much longer.

'_I swear, I'm gonna lose a few serious screws if I continue to stick around him. I can almost feel my IQ descending to his level of stupidity. Ugh. As long as he keeps his mouth shut, he's not even that bad. It's almost as if he's hell-bent on pissing me off. Why? He must be either really smart or really fucking stupid. At this point, I wouldn't place my bets on either of those options...'_

"Alrighty then, here goes... Question Number One: Tell me about your family."

Frowning, Squall regarded the blond with a look out of dark grey orbs that struck like daggers of pure ice.

'_Well, scratch that last bit. He really **is** a stupid fucking prick. Apparently he doesn't even know the difference between an order and a question.'_

"No," the brunette decided to bite back his sarcasm and instead gave a simple reply for the simple mind. "Forget it."

"Oh? Why not?" Seifer asked innocently, but there was a glint in his eyes that was far from pure. "It's not like I won't meet them in about five minutes anyway... ain't that right?"

Like it or not, the "prick" had a point there.

Squall's hands clutched to fists beneath his arms at the (unfortunately) undeniable truth in those words. He wanted to slap himself for his unforgivable idiocy; just what had he been thinking, inviting Seifer over to his house for breakfast as if it had been the single greatest idea in the world? Ridiculous. Surely, he could have come up with some kind of excuse to avoid all of this...?

'_... Ladies and gentlemen, it's official – Squall Leonhart is losing it. Why, you ask? I don't fucking know why! I don't get it, okay! Why can't I get rid of him like everyone else? I'm a fool for letting things get this far.'_

Well, one way or another, it was a tad bit too late for regrets. Hence, Squall came to the conclusion that it would be smarter to answer Seifer's questions _now,_ instead of at the family breakfast table. Squall had never been one to lie because he despised dishonesty, but he would bend the truth when the situation left him little or no other choice. Doing so in front of his mother, however, would clearly prove to be difficult.

Finally, he let out a small sigh.

"There's... nothing to tell."

He emphasized that vague reply with a light, graceful sweep of his arm – a gesture that could have been perfectly deceiving...

Hadn't Seifer known better than that.

"Nothing, eh? That's hard to believe," the blond murmured shiftily. "Well, let's see... I heard you've got a lil sister. That right?"

The brunette's features slanted in an icy expression of repulse that was nothing short of intimidating. Oh, Squall most definitely didn't like the sound of this at all – just where exactly had Seifer obtained that bit of private information about his family from? The brunette had never mentioned his sister to anyone, or at least he believed that he hadn't. In any case, he had certainly never told Mister "Nosy Ass" Almasy about her.

After all, he possessed a well functional piece of grey matter, thank you very much.

'_How did he manage to find out about Ell? Someone must have told him, but who? I can't think of anyone. And... what else does he know...?'_

"So, do you?"

In his contemplation of Seifer's sources, Squall had almost forgotten that the brawny blond was still waiting patiently for an answer by his side, curious as ever.

Well, what did it matter? Seifer was right – he was going to find out about Squall's family soon enough. Whether or not Squall gave the information away freely really did not make a difference at this point.

"... Yeah. I have a sister."

Frustrated over the fact that he had been tricked into admitting more than he had originally planned to, Squall blew a few stray strands of chocolate brown hair out of his face and crinkled his nose. His head was aching slightly from the lack of sleep and the events that had uncoiled during the night, although on second thought... when he _had_ fallen asleep in Seifer's bed, curled up in the blond's oddly comforting embrace, it had been a calm, dreamless slumber.

And, rest assured, "dreamless" was a term that was second to none where Squall Leonhart's sleeping habits were concerned.

'_Hm. I don't understand... how can I possibly sleep better at the house of a complete stranger, who just so happens to be a horny weirdo, than in my own bed at home? ... Yeah right. Who am I kidding? I - of all people - should know the answer to that question. Nonetheless...'_

"What's her name? Your sister's, I mean. Uh, by the way, which exit are we takin'?

"Her name's Ellone," Squall replied flatly as his train of thoughts derailed. "Take 78 South."

Seifer, who had propped up his right elbow on the console between their seats, laughed quietly at those reluctant monosyllables.

"You're starting to sound like some kinda robot, you know that?" he teased lightly as he performed some very edgy movements with his right hand, obviously mimicking a mechanical creature of some kind. "Error, can't compute, error..."

Squall snorted grimly in response, death glare firmly in place as he folded down all the fingers of his left hand, save for the longest digit.

"Fuck you."

Seifer, however, seemed oddly amused by the fact that he had just been flipped off.

"... My, quite the vulgar bot, mind you. Whoever programmed you, anyway?"

"Do me a favor and drop dead already."

"Oooh - touchy, aren't we? Hmm, perhaps you're just in need of an oil change or something of that sort..." Seifer mused with a wide grin, while poking an exasperate Squall in the ribs with the playfulness of a four year old. "Come on, lemme handle it, I'm good with lube and that kinda stuff!"

Okay, maybe not so much a "four year old" after all – Seifer was a downright _pervert_!

Squall snarled warningly as he tried to escape Seifer's reach and swiped out at the blond's hand in annoyance, determined to get away from the sex crazed maniac even if it meant bailing out of a moving vehicle.

"Perhaps _you_ need to have yourself a mouthful of shut the fuck up, asshole," he spat dryly when he finally managed to slap Seifer's arm aside.

The older blond whistled through his teeth at the razor sharp spikes of sarcasm that prickled Squall's tone. The brunette's usual, flawless personification of a deaf mute was really quite deceiving; Squall could be a snappy little bitch when the mood struck him. Funny enough, Seifer found that trait more than intriguing. He could appreciate a good challenge, which was probably one of the reasons why he hadn't given up on Squall "Ice Princess" Leonhart the very first day that they had met and clashed like fire and ice.

... On second thought, Squall's pretty face and alluring body most likely had something to do with it, too.

"That's exit 78 over there," the dark-haired boy informed him dully, unknowingly shaking Seifer out of a kinky daydream that, had he known the details, would've likely driven Squall to castrate the blond with a flamethrower.

"... I knew that, kitten."

Pre-occupied as he had been, Seifer truly _hadn't_ known, but that was really beside the point.

"Yeah. Like hell you did."

Of course, Squall was on to him – as usual.

'_Ah well, at least he's talking, eh? Hooray for me.'_

They took the ramp off the highway and proceeded down a steep hill until they hit a wide, four way intersection. With an encouraging smile, Seifer turned to Squall for assistance. After all, he knew perfectly well that the stubborn teen would rather let both of them rot at the crossroads than give the blond directions again without being begged and pleaded beforehand.

"Hey, which way now?"

"I thought you knew where we were going?"

Touché.

"Why did I see this coming?" Seifer sighed arduously, but his voice was fluttering with humor. "Why no, your sweet Icicleness of Doom, I do not know the way to your great abode of supreme and utter bitchiness. So, uh, might you be so kind as to guide me there, si le voulai plaise?"

"... Your French is so bad, it's giving me a headache," Squall groaned while demonstratively massaging his right temple with the tips of his fingers. "Just shut the hell up, alright? And stop calling me names!"

Then, he dispassionately jabbed his left thumb towards the driver's side, almost hitting Seifer in the face as he did so.

"Go left. And don't say another damn word, got it?"

Seifer complied with the hostile command, if only to live to find out exactly which place it was that Squall called "home"; it was knowledge of the kind that was clearly worth suffering for.

Soon enough, the suburban environment around them changed. Lush trees and colorful flower beds became more abundant, as did the houses that stood on either side of the road, which were increasing dramatically in size and value. To be honest, Seifer was somewhat surprised; Squall had never quite struck him as your stereotypical spoiled trust fund baby with snobbish parents who had too much cash to really know what to do with. On the contrary, there wasn't a single grain of vanity floating about in Squall's body, nor did he appear like the kind of person who valued money or status at all. Instead, the brunette practically slaved at "Ward's Diner" – why and what for, Seifer still couldn't understand.

He couldn't possibly be _enjoying_ his job, could he...?

What a loony idea.

"Turn right up there, at Brush Hollow Drive."

"Brush Hollow? 'Aight."

Seifer elegantly swerved around the turn that Squall had pointed out to him, while flicking sideway glances at the houses to his left and right that reminded him so very much of his own home back in Balamb. Frankly, he didn't care too much for these surgically clean, perfectly picturesque neighborhoods. They looked so lifeless and fake. People rarely, if ever, spent time in their professionally landscaped yards, let alone out in the neatly swept streets; one could easily believe that most of these places were downright deserted, had it not been for the expensive vehicles parked in every single driveway.

"It's number 15440," Squall said quietly, his voice unusually flat and bodiless. "The white stucco one."

"'Kay."

As they slowly pulled up alongside the huge, elegantly crafted, three story tall home that was practically hidden within a glade of blooming trees, neatly trimmed shrubs and a tall, black, cast iron fence, Seifer let out an acknowledging whistle.

"Damn," he lilted as he looked the property up and down past Squall's rigid profile. "That's quite the pad you got there!"

"Whatever. Park right here or pull up into the driveway. I don't give a fuck either way."

Seifer arched both brows at the unexpected chill that had iced up the brunette's words. Perplexed, the blond locked his gaze to the narrow, steel blue eyes right across from his own; Squall Leonhart, the living, walking (and occasionally talking) freezer compartment. What the hell was he upset over this time? Annoyed, Seifer noted the younger boy fiddling with his seatbelt - despite the fact that the engine of the truck was still running. For some reason, the brunette seemed to have trouble releasing the buckle, and at a closer look, Seifer noticed that Squall's fingers were shaking.

'_What the hell...?'_

"Hey... you alright?" Seifer asked slowly and curled his right hand around Squall's left forearm in order to steady it.

He wasn't the least bit surprised that Squall wouldn't look at him, despite his genuinely concerned inquiry; instead, the seventeen year old simply froze in his erratic movements and snapped his head around to stare bleakly out the front windshield as if he had completely forgotten about everything and everyone around him.

"Squall...? What's the matter?"

Squall's front bangs were falling smoothly into his dark, blank eyes, almost hiding them from Seifer's view. Finally, the brunette shook his head from side to side, as if banishing a shroud of shadows that were plaguing him, and he brushed the offensive strands of hair out of his face.

"... It's nothing."

He gave his arm a sharp tug and Seifer released it, although his sun tanned features were still littered with a worried frown. This entire situation was seriously starting to confuse him. Squall had become much more agitated ever since they had crossed into the posh neighborhood, but Seifer couldn't possibly figure out the reason for that change in the brunette's behavior.

Of course, that didn't mean that he wasn't going to try.

'_You tellin' me he's scared of going home...? Nah, no way. It's home, right? Home, sweet home, that kinda good stuff. Hm... then again, I guess it **would** explain him hiding out in the playground at night, if him not liking his home was the case and all. Maybe he doesn't get along with his parents? I wouldn't exactly be surprised... He seemed pretty fussy over his mom, though. But what about his dad, anyway? He hasn't mentioned his old man once. Didn't that Selphie chick at the restaurant say he was a lawyer or somethin' like that? Don't really remember. Well, I'll find out here in a minute, I suppose. Still... I wish he'd tell me what's wrong.'_

"Nothin', huh? Right... whatever floats your boat, Squall," the older blond murmured in an indistinct tone of voice, before releasing Squall's seatbelt with an effortless push of his thumb. "There you go."

"... Hrn."

Feeling more serious and prudent now than he had all morning, Seifer turned off the engine of his truck. He watched Squall opening his door and easing out of his seat, before silently following the younger boy's example. As he slammed his door and activated the car alarm, quietly listening to the familiar beeping sound of the locks kicking in, he suddenly registered Squall's eyes on himself. The brunette was standing on the other side of the flame red hood, studying him with a strange, detached expression on his pretty face. Instinctively, Seifer hitched an assuring grin onto his lips.

"Relax, kitten," he purred with deliberate arrogance, "Your parents are gonna love me."

A rush of unsorted, misplaced emotions and hastily jerked up barriers flickered across the dim, smoke grey surface of Squall's eyes. The sight granted Seifer an interesting glimpse of the brunette's disheveled state of mind, before the younger boy finally whisked his head to the side and broke their visual contact.

There were certain thoughts and feelings stirring within him that Seifer definitely did not need to know about.

"Whatever."

After grunting his trademark "I-really-don't-give-a-shit" reply, Squall briskly marched up to the front gate to open it. To the blond's surprise, it didn't even seem to be locked. Seifer traipsed along behind Squall, fascinated by both the dark haired boy's enticing rear view and the breathtaking residence that was obviously the brunette's home. As they passed through the tall, iron wrought gate, however, Seifer stopped in his stride to turn around and blink at a polished brass plate that was embedded into an ivory colored stone pillar.

¤ KEARAN ¤

'_... "Kearan"? The hell? Rewind that. I thought his last name was Leonhart?'_

"Uh," Seifer piped up, one hand on the back of his head and the other one in the air in a futile attempt to catch Squall's attention, "Not to sound like a complete moron or nothin', but... you sure this is the right house?"

Squall halted on the sand colored, flagstone path that wound in intricate twists and turns all the way to the front door to cast a narrow-eyed glare over his shoulder.

"What kind of dumb question is that?" he hissed with the gentleness of ice cubes coating his voice as he fastened his hands around his hips and shifted his weight onto his right foot.

Seifer snorted mutely to himself at the picture.

'_Oooh, bitchy, aren't we just? If looks could kill, he'd have it made...'_

"Well, this shiny lil sign here says 'Kearan' and then there's me, thinking your last name was Leonhart," Seifer shrugged the brunette's frostiness off and pointed at the pillar. "That sorta makes it a valid question, doesn't it?"

Something in Squall's ominous expression seemed to change, though Seifer couldn't quite say what he was seeing.

"No, you're right," the younger boy answered evasively as he darted directionless looks all around the beautifully landscaped yard, and the edge in his voice had been replaced with discomfort. "My last name _is _Leonhart."

"Then why-"

"... Kearan is my stepfather's name."

Unwilling to elaborate on the sensitive topic any further for the time or _lifespan_ being, Squall simply ignored Seifer's questioning face and continued walking. His eyes discreetly scanned the paved driveway, and he was admittedly relieved to discover only his mother's dark blue van and his own black Honda.

'_Guess he's already out playing golf. At least something's going well this morning.'_

He heaved a grateful, almost inaudible sigh and flicked another look at Seifer, who was following him with visible reluctance.

"Are you coming, or what?" the brunette asked, his tone almost playful now as some stress and pressure had fallen off him. "Trust me, I live here."

'_... Whether I like it or not.'_

Seifer only nodded curtly in response; his typically so open features gave away nothing – neither feelings nor thoughts on Squall's sudden adjustment in attitude. Despite his misleading display of indifference, however, Seifer was quite moved by the picture of an intoxicatingly beautiful brunette waiting calmly for him in the midst of blooming trees and gently falling leaves that seemed to surf on the currents of the wind. The younger boy's eyes were mostly obscured by wispy tendrils of dark brown hair swaying softly in the early fall breeze, but the blond could tell that some of the hardness had yielded from their steel grey surface.

If Seifer had needed any kind of incentive to keep moving forward, this surely did the trick.

"I know - I trust ya," the older teen declared in a warm, baritone voice that had coarsed with emotions, before he finally picked up his pace.

As they stepped up to the front door, Seifer was given some time to admire the numerous colorful flower baskets and antique patio furniture that was arranged elegantly across the white, spacious porch which seemed to wrap around the entire mansion like a ribbon. He casually tried to peak through one of the countless windows that were set into every single stucco covered wall, but the breezy lace curtains and black shutters didn't allow much sight into the house. Instead, the blond noticed a pair of wild songbirds floundering about noisily in the clear water of a birdbath, just off the right side of the steps that lead up the front porch.

'_Guess someone's an animal lover, huh. Ah... that's right, Squall said he used to have a dog. I still have no idea what the hell happened to it. He sure seemed upset when he told me about it, though. And what's with the whole Kearan and Leonhart thing, anyway? Hm... his "stepfather" he said... man, doesn't that ever sound like fun, huh? Yurgh. Having a real father is bad enough, lemme tell ya. Kinda explains why Squall never mentioned him before. The dude must make bank though, that much is for sure. Just look at this fuckin' pad! Lawyer, huh? Looks like little Selphie knows her stuff alright.'_

Out of the corner of his jade green eyes, he saw Squall nervously tugging on the hem of his shirt sleeves. His slender hands disappeared almost entirely within the creases of scarlet red fabric, revealing nothing of the white bandages that were hidden beneath, but a deep furrow had etched itself into Squall's forehead all the same.

He looked worried.

"It's alright," Seifer whispered in an attempt at reassurance as he sashayed to the brunette's side and tilted his head down to him. "Nobody's going to notice."

"Whatever," Squall snorted, no emotion touching his eyes, but he sounded skeptic.

The dark-haired teen had begun to search for something in the pocket of his jeans and Seifer guessed that "something" to be his set of house keys, but he never really found out for sure, because the heavy, expensive looking cherry wood door with the colorful stained glass mosaics before them already creaked open from the inside.

"Big brother! Mommy, Squally's home! Mommy!"

Seifer had heard the girl long before she had stuck her cute little face through the crack of the door, which she assertively pushed ajar even further, despite the obvious physical struggle that the task opposed her with.

'_Wow. Man, she's a tiny lil thing.'_

And indeed, tiny she was. To Seifer, the pale skinned, chocolate-haired girl that had appeared before them looked like a most precious, fragile china doll in her silky blue shirt, white shorts and adorable green socks. Her physical resemblance to Squall was striking, and there was no doubt in the blond's mind that he was faced with Ellone – Squall's younger sister.

"Big brot-"

She suddenly fell silent in her excited chanting as she noticed the huge blond boy towering next to her older brother. With a somewhat reserved expression, she retreated a little ways back into the house to stare at Seifer out of wide, hazelnut-colored eyes from what obviously struck her as a safer distance.

"Hey, Ell," Squall greeted her with an encouraging smile as he lowered himself onto his right knee before her. "Thanks for getting the door, Sis."

Seifer listened in wonder to the new, much brighter coloring in Squall's low, mesmerizing voice as he spoke to his sister. He seemed to be glowing from the inside, as if the fragile little girl standing in front of him was the one source of all his strength and self-confidence.

"Hey, what's up? Not gonna say hi to me now?" Squall asked, a sudden hint of playfulness to him that was entirely unfamiliar to Seifer.

To their amusement, Ellone looked straight past her beloved brother and pointed at Seifer with the genuine, carefree bluntness that only children possess.

"Who's that?" she asked in a bubbly voice and curled up her nose. "He's _big_."

Squall turned his head slightly and glanced at Seifer from over his shoulder. His lips were twitching in the semblance of a perfect smile, and a bright spark was dancing in his fathomless blue eyes which no shadow, no matter how dark, could ever snuff out.

"That's Seifer," Squall explained kindly as he veered his head back around to Ell. "He's a friend from school. Seifer, this is my sister Ellone."

The blond smirked at the formal introduction (as well as the fact that Squall had just labeled him a "friend" for the second time in less than 24 hours) and angled himself down to the girl in a playful bow.

"Nice to meet ya, lil lady," he cooed huskily.

To his surprise, Ell opened the door even wider to step forward and hold one of her hands up in the air with all of her small fingers extended.

"I'm five," she declared proudly, which caused both Seifer and Squall to chuckle under their breath.

"Really?" Seifer grinned, mocking amazement as he happily played along. "Five already? Damn! Now that you mention it, you do look all grown up. You're a little lady alright, miss Ellone."

When Ellone giggled ecstatically at the compliment, Squall couldn't help but feel a strange fondness towards Seifer. This guy... although he seemed like a stupid, insensitive oaf at first sight, Squall had to admit that he was far from it. Despite his brute strength and frequent fits of blatant idiocy, Seifer was no less kind and genuine – almost gentle in his own way. On top of that, his passionate kisses and the touch of his hands back at the apartment had held enough infliction upon Squall to turn the brunette's spinal column into a pitiful puddle of goo.

The mere memory of Seifer's intimate caresses alone caused a shudder to race across Squall's skin.

'_Dammit, pull yourself together. It's not like it was all **that** great! I mean...'_

Squall cast a quick glance at the blond from his kneeling position, afraid to be caught, but when soft blue met with powerful emerald green, the brunette came to realize that Seifer had been watching him all this time.

'_What am I thinking?'_ Squall groaned inwardly as his heart skipped a series of beats in his chest and he quickly dropped his gaze like a stone. _'I can't be doing this! So what if he isn't the brick-headed football jock that I originally took him for? That doesn't mean anything. Not a damn thing, okay?'_

He knew he was lying to himself the moment that his cheeks tinged crimson under Seifer's intent stare, but even so, the truth was far too scary to acknowledge. In some sense, Squall was right – he couldn't be doing this; he couldn't allow himself to be affected by Seifer's sweetness or his bold charm, because if he did, the consequences could be dire enough to destroy everything that he had suffered and bled for these past years. No immature infatuation was worth such a risk.

And yet... he had never before been so tempted.

Shaking his head in disapproval with himself, Squall stood up. His sister was still gazing at Seifer in childish awe and the blond was smiling back at her tenderly, full of patience and good natured humor as he was holding a conversation with her like a real grown-up.

"... Barbies you say? Why, of course I love Barbies! You got any?"

"Yeah! Lotsa Barbies!" Ell exclaimed with a bright laugh that rang profoundly in Squall's heart, before she suddenly turned to her brother. "Ohh... Squally, I like your shirt!"

Squall smiled helplessly as she placed one of her tiny hands on his thigh and utilized the other to tug on the hem of his flame red shirt in delight. He saw Seifer's lips smoothing into a grin as their gazes clashed, causing Squall's pretty features to produce just the tiniest of frowns.

'_Don't look so content with yourself. She's a five year old whose favorite piece of clothing is a striped pink scarf with vomit green bobbles. Of course she'd flip over a red fucking football jersey.'_

"Ell, honey, I told you not to open the door on your... Oh, Squall! You're home! No wonder your sister was so excited."

Both Squall and Seifer turned their heads to blink at the slender, dark-haired woman that had suddenly appeared behind Ellone. She wore a short, white summer dress of equal simplicity and elegance, a colorful apron slung loosely around her lithe waist and the most gentle, heartwarming smile that Seifer had ever laid eyes on in his life. He no longer had to guess where Squall had obtained his mind-boggling beauty genes from, because this attractive lady could be none other than the brunette's mother herself.

Even if, at second glance, Seifer had to admit that she looked almost too young.

"Hey, Mom," Squall greeted her quietly, eradicating any kind of doubt that Seifer could have been nurturing over the woman's identity.

"Hi sweetie, how was your sleepover?" she asked blithely and her smile grew even wider as her cobalt blue eyes fell onto Seifer. "Oh, you must be Seifer, right? It's so nice to meet you! Squall doesn't bring home friends very often, you know."

She winked at him, as if letting him in on a secret, and her chestnut colored hair poured smoothly over her shoulders as she leaned forward.

"I think he must have taken quite a liking to you," she chirped.

Squall cringed visibly and groaned in embarrassment, but his pained "Mom, please..." only caused the dark haired woman to giggle in amusement. Laughing, she pulled the door wide open and offered her pale, slender hand to Seifer.

"I'm Raine, Squall's mother," she explained with a lively melody to her voice that made her seem even younger than she was. "Please, come in and make yourself at home!"

Seifer shook her hand with a winning grin that he knew could make any girl swoon, regardless of age or marital status.

"Thanks a lot for the invitation, Miss, uh, Leonhart."

'_... It is Leonhart, right? Kearan, maybe? Damn, I feel like a dumbass.'_

For a second, Seifer thought that Squall had shot him a warning glare out of the corner of his eyes, but his attention was already diverted by Raine breathing another small laugh and shaking her head vigorously.

"No - no, please – just call me Raine," she said before motioning all of them inside the house with a beautiful smile. "Please, come in!"

Nodding sheepishly, Seifer followed the three brunettes inside. Ellone was bouncing along behind her mother, occasionally peeking at Seifer from over her shoulder and giggling as she did so. Seifer only looked around the vaulted, marble tiled entrance hall briefly before he caught up with Squall and whispered to him.

"Your mom's the _bomb_," he declared, sounding honestly impressed. "How old is she, anyway? She looks really young."

"She's thirty-five," Squall answered evasively, before he suddenly stopped in his stride and glowered at the bright red jersey sleeves that covered his arms. "... I have to go upstairs and change."

"Change...? Oh. Uh. Okay?"

They looked each other up and down silently, as if neither of them was entirely sure how to approach this entire "You really piss me off, but you're in my house, so what the fuck am I gonna do with you?" kind of situation. To Squall, simply abandoning the blond downstairs to fend for himself seemed like the simplest and most enticing of options, but he knew well enough that his mom would start asking questions if he treated his newly acquired "friend" so rudely ("Hell – she should know better," Squall thought defiantly). Not to mention what disturbing ideas Seifer would come up with if he was left alone just long enough.

Finally, Squall heaved a broken sigh and slumped his shoulders in defeat.

"Mom?" he called out to his mother, who had already disappeared in the kitchen. "Uh... I'm gonna take Seifer upstairs and show him my room."

"Okay, Squall," she shouted back contently. "I'll start making the pancakes!"

"Right..." Squall groaned, rubbing his forehead with the heel of his hand. "We'll be back in a minute."

Squall knew he was going to regret saying what he had with Seifer in earshot the very moment that he leveled his cold gaze with the most annoying prick on the entire planet, who had a smirk plastered on his face the size of the equator.

"Oh la laaa... you're gonna 'show me your room', huh?" Seifer snickered, preening himself in a prissy kind of way that made Squall want to punch him for it. "I dunno if I'm ready for that yet, babydoll. I mean, this is goin' kinda fast... I'm a decent girl, y'know."

"You _will _be a girl if you don't shut the fuck up," Squall hissed back testily, and there was no doubt in Seifer's mind that he meant it.

"No threatening my crown jewels please, thank you," the blond winced and cupped his crotch. "Hurts just thinking about it."

"Then can it, asshole."

Seifer gave him a long, thoughtful look-over, before he tilted his head to the side and cracked a misleadingly innocent grin.

"... You really _are_ into the whole S&M thing, aren't you?"

"..."

There was no way in hell Squall was going to bother giving any kind of reply to that – short of another well-placed death glare, of course, which seared right through the blond, but had doubtlessly been aimed to nail him to the next best wall.

Finally rolling his eyes and grunting in resignation, Squall made his way towards the long, carpeted mahogany stairway that led up to the first floor. He didn't care whether Seifer was following him or not, but judging by the irritating sound of sneakers being dragged on marble floors, he obviously was.

"So, she's thirty-five, huh?" Seifer piped up, annoying as ever.

Squall breathed what felt like the hundredth sigh that day.

"... As you heard."

"Wow, that _is _really young... My mom's like, gee, I dunno. Sometimes, I think she's a leprechaun or something because she never looks a day older than forty," Seifer contemplated, scratching his chin in thought. "Then again, she _is_ a beauty surgeon..."

'_Don't tell me that. I don't want to know. Your family is none of my business, okay?'_

"... Thanks a lot for that useless anecdote."

"Anytime, cupcake. So, tell me - if this is your stepfather's pad, uhm, where's your real dad at?"

Squall _had_ been marching upstairs with the disturbingly brisk determination of a drill sergeant on steroids, but he slowed down considerably at that question – in fact, he came to a complete fucking standstill on one of the steps and whipped around, something very close to bloodlust flaring in his eyes.

Seifer gulped and took a precautious half-step back, realizing at once that the Almasian battleship had crossed into hostile territory.

"He's _dead_, alright!" Squall lashed out at him, but there was no hurt or sadness in the way he caterwauled those words – more like quickly incensed, long-nurtured anger. "And unless you wanna find your-_fucking_-self in the same condition, you'd better not _ever_ mention him again!"

Seifer watched the seething youth from about an arm's length distance (which couldn't be considered safe by any means), his own expression genuinely blank and taken aback, wondering how the hell he had managed to fuck this one up.

'_Jeez, that must be one sensitive spot I struck there. Note to self – unless you're wearing a full set of riot gear, don't even think about mentioning the kitten's old man because he'll turn into a fuckin' saber tooth.'_

In a temporary fit of wisdom, Seifer decided not to say a single word and tried to look as innocent as practically possible. The brunette was still glaring at him from his elevated position, until he eventually took a very short, hard and audible breath and whirled around once more, ascending the stairs. Seifer thought that he heard him mumbling something in a choked voice that sounded vaguely like "I'll fucking kill the both of you, fucking good for fucking nothing imbecile fucks," but in all honesty, he was a bit too intimidated to inquire what exactly that was supposed to mean. If Squall used the f-word four times in one sentence, it was probably safe to assume that he was royally pissed off.

When Squall continued to stalk upstairs in his blind rage, past the first floor and up to the second, Seifer followed him stubbornly, but figured it wise to keep his distance. Their physical separation gave him just enough time to ogle the dozens of framed pictures that lined both the stairway and just about every wall that Seifer could view from his unfavorable position. They weren't just any kind of pictures, either; considering that the one and only subject was lions (in every form, color and shape imaginable), they were obviously pieces of art that Squall had created at various points in his life.

'_Art... that's a safe subject with him, right? **Right?** Fuck, nothing's safe with this guy. Say the wrong thing and he'll pummel you down the stairs without thinking on it twice. Ah well, I have to at least try, right? Just have to make sure that he doesn't get into close proximity of my balls when he's handling any kind of sharp object. I wouldn't put it past him to make true of his threat.'_

"... Did you draw all these?" Seifer dared to ask, ensuring to smile sweetly, just in case.

"What do you think?" Squall snapped back snidely without stopping once. "If you can think at all, that is."

'_... Here we go again,'_ Seifer snarled to himself. _'Fuck playing it docile, man – I've never been the submissive type anyway.'_

Well, admiring Squall's artwork had sounded like a brilliant plan in theory, but Seifer found it impossible to stick to that kind of plan when confronted with the brunette's smart ass little comments.

"As a matter of fact, I can think just fine, and I _think_ you're being a real bitch, Squally-boy," he shot back cockily.

"You're confusing me with someone who cares, _Seifer_," Squall retorted with a repulsed sneer.

"Like you even know what the word 'care' means."

"Like it's any of your fucking business."

They kept going back and forth like that for a little while longer, until it finally struck Seifer that this kind of pointless, childish banter was getting him nowhere. The only thing he had accomplished was to find out just how exactly his name sounded with as much bare hatred and cynicism poured into it as possible.

Splendid.

"... You're hopeless," Seifer finally drawled in defeat.

"And you're an asshole. Your point?"

Well, on second thought, maybe it was about time to show the smart mouthed lil bastard that he wasn't the only one with an attitude!

"... My point? Let's fuckin' see here... Oh – my _point_ is that if your tight little ass wouldn't look so goddamn hot strutting up these stairs, I wouldn't even bother to put up with that bitchy attitude of yours that you're obviously confusing with a personality! I mean, what the fuck are you, _PMSing_? You've gotta be the crankiest motherfucker I've ever come across!"

... Then again, maybe it wasn't.

Already regretting his impulsive outburst, Seifer winced and readied himself for another hissy fit from hell that surprisingly never came. Instead, Squall had veered around to him once more and let his right arm slice the thinning air between them like whiplash. He was still glaring, of course, but in an agitated way more so than anything else.

"Shut up, idiot!" Squall ordered in a subdued, strained hiss. "Don't say shit like that!"

"Huh? What shit? The shit about your hot ass? Why not?" Seifer shrugged nonchalantly, apparently oblivious to what was good for his health. "Who's gonna hear us? The lions on the walls? Tche. You must've never watched the Discovery Channel. They fuck like a bunch of rabbits hopped up on Viagra, so no need to be shy."

Squall stared back at him blankly for a moment, before his face fell and he shook his head in resignation. "... I hate you."

Seifer smiled evenly, looking oddly pleased with himself. "I know you do."

Rolling his eyes in annoyance, Squall proceeded to the second floor without saying another word. He had to pull himself together; allowing Seifer to toy with his mind was absolutely unacceptable. He'd have to keep his cool, no matter how difficult it proved to be. This was just a test of his patience, nothing more, and there was no way that he was going to fail.

In all honesty, he wasn't even really angry at Seifer – not as much as he was angry at himself, anyway. The blond had an undeniable effect on him, and by all gods ever worshipped by mankind, it scared the shit out of the brunette. The very last thing he needed was for Seifer to make a provocative comment like that in front of his mother or sister... or, worst of all, his stepfather.

_Kato._

Instinctively, his body tensed at the name, which rang cold and unkind like a curse inside his head.

_Kato..._

'_He shouldn't be home until this afternoon... he **shouldn't** be, he never is. Don't panic - it'll be alright. I'm sure. I just have to get Seifer's ass outta here by then, or else we'll both be in very deep shit. There's no way I'm getting him involved in this...'_

Totally entangled in that web of troublesome thoughts, Squall was almost shocked to suddenly find himself standing in front of his bedroom door and gazing at it with vacant, unseeing eyes.

"Even your door is black, huh?" the blond behind him quipped. "My. How fitting."

"About as fitting as my fist'll be in your face," Squall countered, before he called himself to mind that he was supposed to act friendly.

'Friendly'... every syllable of that term had him shuddering with disgust.

'_... I hate him. I really do.'_

"Damn. Violent much?" Seifer shot back sarcastically.

"Whatever," Squall murmured, his defenses rising, and the sudden discomfort in his voice was painfully transparent. "Just shut up and come in."

The urge to add a warning "but don't touch anything or I'll throw your ass down the stairs" was quite tempting, but he figured that after spending all night at the blond's apartment, such a request was probably out of the question. Therefore, there was little for Squall to do but take a deep breath and curl his fingers around the stainless steel handle before him to unconsciously lift the covers off a heart-wrenching story that had commenced three years ago.

_Three years..._

Three years of lies told too easily, illusions conjured up too hastily and a reality that had claimed Squall's innocence and tainted his faith into the basic goodness of mankind. Ever since the tender age of fourteen, he had experienced pain in all its sickening, traumatizing facets, and the memories had ruined him for life. These days, fear and mistrust always loomed like shadows in the back of his mind. He expected nothing and wanted nothing, and yet some unscarred, oppressed part of him was willing to take a chance that he had never believed in to begin with.

Why?

His jaw tightened as he ground his teeth together and his thoughts suddenly orbited around one particular person alone.

'_Because...'_

A low, husky voice suddenly ghosted the nape of his neck with a soft chuckle that gave him goose bumps and caused his heartbeat to skip, while the warm, moist breath against his skin was weaving an almost soothing, sacred symphony.

"Jeez, always so dead serious. You really are cute, Squall..."

Squall's head began to spin in a pandemonium of emotions – hate, anger, fear, loneliness, hopefulness, desire – and in the end he was so entirely confused by his own mind that he no longer even knew which feeling to grasp and claim as his very own. Maybe they were_ all _his, but how could one person possibly be so split apart in who they were and what they wanted? How could all these sentiments be flitting through his mind like fireflies, so frail and breakable and yet so capable of burning his very soul if he dared to get just a little too close - just a little too attached?

_..:"Say a word to anyone and you'll regret it for the rest of your life, Squall. You belong to **me**, and no one else - don't forget that.":.._

'_How could I ever forget? Ngh. Dammit... my chest hurts...'_

Somewhere through this unsolvable puzzle of thoughts and emotions, however, Squall noticed Seifer's arm curled loosely around his waist and the blond's chest flat against his back, breathing evenly onto that uncovered, ivory slash of skin that connected the brunette's narrow shoulders with his neck. The sudden bodily contact caused Squall's natural defenses to flare up, and impulse drove him to stagger backwards with a stifled yelp. Unfortunately, that abrupt motion only resulted in both him and Seifer having to wrestle gravity for the ability to remain standing as their legs became dangerously entangled.

"W-whoa, Squall, what the-"

"Unh...!"

The back of Squall's head almost collided with Seifer's chin as the brunette backed against him in his disheveled, wrecked state of mind. Luckily, Seifer was in full custody of his senses and managed to steady himself as well as the brunette against a likely fall. His arm never strayed from Squall's lean torso; in fact, he even tightened his hold around the enticing body that fell against him so powerlessly.

It was only thanks to him that they didn't collapse to the hardwood floor, but the brunette in his embrace proved to be rather ungrateful of said heroic "rescue". Jerking to the left and right like a slippery eel, Squall finally succeeded in struggling free from the arms that had encircled him and out of Seifer's immediate proximity. He swiveled around hastily and backed against the wall next to his closed bedroom door, his face flushed and his chest tight with anxiety.

Seifer merely regarded him with a calm look out of spellbinding peridot eyes, not moving an inch from his position.

"What the hell was that for?" he asked demurely as he brushed some wrinkles out of his olive green shirt, cocking his eyebrow in question. "Huh?"

He could see Squall fighting to wrench down a nervous breakdown of some sort. The brunette had his hands placed palms-down against the burgundy colored wallpaper behind him, and he pressed himself unto it as if his dear life depended upon that hard, unyielding surface.

"Squall...?"

Ignoring the screaming stop signs, Seifer took a thoughtless step into the younger boy's direction, which Squall accredited with a small, but terrified wince. As a result, the blond halted again almost that same instant, and his handsome features creased deeply in discontent.

'_What the fuck is the matter with him? For real, I don't get it. How can one person go from being a sarcastic hardass to a shivering wreck in the blink of an eye? He looks like he's about to completely freak the fuck out. I better calm him the hell down before he does just that...'_

"Squall," he repeated the brunette's name slowly, putting careful emphasis onto every single letter. "What's wrong?"

_..: "What's wrong, Squall? Not liking it? Aww... pity. Am I hurting you, is that it? Do you wanna cry for your mommy? By all means, do - it'll make this all the more enjoyable. Come on, Squall. Do it - cry for me. I want nothing more than to hear you scream." :.._

"I... I..."

The dark-haired boy's heart chilled as his breath came in painful thrusts from his lungs, short and fast. His knees were trembling as if they were about to cave in, and his eyes had an expression of pure fear latched to the steel grey swirling within. Seifer had seen something like this before, twice now – once when he had jokingly straddled Squall in bed and a second time in the kitchen, when the brunette had been laid out beneath him on the table. This guy was so frightened of physical closeness that it was almost unreal.

'_Why? Why is he so scared? I just don't get it. What the hell is going on here?'_

Suitably worried, Seifer edged closer. Squall saw him moving and cringed again, this time followed by a whimpered "Don't..."

"What? _'Don't'_ what, Squall?"

The blond tried to keep his cool; they were at the boy's parents' house and most certainly couldn't make a big scene, no matter for what reason. He couldn't allow Squall to spiral into that frightening world that he had created within his mind - he didn't _want_ him to. Thus, he spoke patiently to the younger boy, shading his typically insensitive voice with kindness.

Squall, however, stared at him out of fixed, dull grey orbs that saw nothing but horrifying images that had been carved brutally into the brunette's memory from early adolescence on...

... Over and over and over again.

**.  
**  
_The darkness that surrounded him, every minute of every day._

_The white feather pillow that readily swallowed the raw misery in his cries._

_The bitter tears that were his own and tasted like droplets of salt on his lips._

_The weight crushing him against the mattress beneath him, rendering him immobile and defenseless._

_The sharp pain lancing up his spine, spreading inside his wounded body like a disease._

_The feeling of being torn to shreds by a physical power that he couldn't oppose._

_The cramps in his hands when they wrenched the sheets for support that he would never find._

_The voice echoing in his ears even long after its bearer had already become one with the darkness once more._

_That voice..._

"_Cry for me."_

"_Cry for me."_

**_Cry for me._**

"**_STOP IT...!_**"

Alarmed by the haunted look on Squall's ghostly face, the sudden rush of tears spangling his cheeks and the panic in his voice as he screamed that desperate command, Seifer finally decided to ditch all of his confusion and cross the distance that parted him and the smaller boy. Without saying a word, he pried Squall from the wall and crushed the frail body against his own. His right arm came around the brunette's waist, while his left hand buried the head covered in a mess of chocolate brown hair into the warm crook of his neck. Instinctively, he begun to mutter a gush of soothing, senseless things as he tightened his embrace when Squall began slamming up resistance.

"Squall, easy, it's okay! Take it easy! It's okay, it-"

But it wasn't okay. It wasn't okay at all.

Because Squall was screaming.

"N-no! Let go! _Let me go_! I don't want it! Get the fuck off me! Get _off_!"

Kicking and sweeping out blindly at the blond, Squall sent a large glass vase filled with snow white orchids flying off a wooden end table by his door to burst into a myriad of shards as it hit the floor. Unfortunately, the deafening noise did nothing to distract or hush the seventeen year old; Seifer could feel him sobbing against his skin and he tried to muffle the brunette's cries by nuzzling his mouth into the thick cotton of his shirt, knowing full well that Raine would hear her son even from all the way downstairs if he didn't do anything to prevent that from happening.

"Squall," he pressed rough and low through barely parted lips, "For god's sake, you have to _calm down_! Your mom's gonna-"

"... Squall? Seifer? Is everything alright up there? What's all that noise?"

... Too late.

'_Fuck!'_

Twitching in uncomfortable anticipation, Seifer hissed a quick "shhh" into Squall's ear and craned his neck around to be able to take a look down the staircase. Luckily, he couldn't see anyone yet, but at least the sharp urgency in his voice had muted the struggling boy in his arms and caused his body to freeze.

_'Fuck, what now? She's gonna come up here and find him looking all psychotic and shit. Fuck! What the hell am I supposed to do now? I don't have a clue!'_

Cringing in apprehension, Seifer settled on doing all that he could.

"I-It's nothing," he bellowed in the direction of the stairs, forcing as much reassurance into the words as humanly possible. "We're just playing around up here. Ain't that right, Squall?"

Pleading, he looked down into the dark blue, tear-rimmed eyes that were gazing up at him so full of anguish and raw terror.

"Say something," Seifer bit fiercely. "If you don't want her to come up and ask questions, then for fuck's sake, _say something_!"

He could tell that something in Squall's mind had finally latched into the situation. The disturbing blankness had yielded from his gaze and given way to sanity, as well as a worried glow. Squall gulped once or twice before his eyelids clenched shut and he drew a shallow breath.

"Y-yeah," he shouted out with his voice as loud and firm as he could bring it to be. "Sorry about the racket, Mom. We'll be there in a minute."

Her response came right away, lacking any kind of mistrusting pause.

"Alright, honey. Just be careful, okay? I know boys will be boys, but don't hurt yourselves, please! Oh, and the pancakes are almost done!"

"O-Okay. Thanks."

Both guys remained perfectly motionless, clinging to each other without even so much as realizing it. Eventually, Squall started to tremble again, but he didn't recoil from Seifer's embrace. Instead, he rested his forehead against the blond's collarbone and waited powerlessly for his tremors to subside. Seifer, more than just slightly perplexed by what had just come to pass, found himself unable to do much but massage the quivering nape of the brunette's neck with just the right amount of pressure and to hold Squall close by the small of his waist.

Inwardly, he too was shivering.

_'Shit... what crazy fuckin' shit have I gotten myself into here...?'_

Standing there amidst a ring of shattered glass, Seifer realized, probably for the first time, that something aside from Squall's self-destructive habit of slashing his wrists was seriously wrong. The slender boy was shaking so violently that it broke his fucking heart, and he had seen suffering in Squall's eyes that no medicine would ever cure.

"Squall," Seifer sighed, his voice crawling over the name with much effort. "Stop shaking."

It was easier said than done, and both of them knew it. Squall finally lifted his head, but his eyes were obscured by long, sweat-slicked tendrils of hair coiling about his waxy skin in intricate patterns. Grunting lovingly, Seifer brushed the stray tresses behind the brunette's ear, but he worried at the tormented look that he discovered on the finely featured face. Uncharacteristically insecure, he caressed the younger boy's damp temples, a wry smile on his face that was supposed to look reassuring.

"Better?" he asked gently, but his heart was aching when he saw Squall's gaze dropping to the ground in shame.

"I... uh..."

Suddenly realizing that he was latched onto Seifer's body like a ship to its anchor, the brunette stiffened in the embrace and half-heartedly attempted to withdraw. The strength of the arms that rooted him into place, however, surpassed his own by far, and the blond was unwilling to release him just yet.

"Squall, relax already. It's just me, okay?"

Squall forced his body to still, even if his panic would not. Part of him understood what the blond had just said so sincerely – this wasn't Kato, it was only Seifer, he wasn't going to hurt him, everything was alright – but there was another, much less trusting side to the frail brunette that just wanted to make a break for it.

"I'm fine," he tried, pushing against the hands on his lower back and neck once more in another futile attempt at escape.

"That's bullshit and you know it," Seifer snarled, his dark voice interlaced with irritation.

"I... just... I'm not used to... I..."

"What's there to be 'used to'?" the blond interrupted Squall's senseless stuttering harshly. "You just totally _freaked out_ on me! What the hell was that all about? What's going on? Something's not right."

Seifer curled his fingers around Squall's jaw and cocked it a few inches into the air, thus leaving the boy little choice but to look him straight in the eyes. Maybe the gesture was too dominant and demanding, but Seifer had just about had enough; he wanted to know why Squall was being so skittish, why he was so goddamn afraid of everything that had to do with physical intimacy and why he would never tell him the reason for any of it at all.

"Squall, tell me what the fuck is wrong with you," he urged, his voice deliberately calm and yet authoritative.

Squall's vision had blurred from the tears, but nonetheless, he could see the inquisitive frown that crumpled Seifer's angular features. His heart was still threatening to thrust through his ribcage in panic; frankly, he had no idea how to maneuver himself out of this one. Perhaps Seifer wasn't the brightest crayon in the box, but he certainly wasn't stupid, either. His obliviousness only went so far.

"I..."

As reality finally got a firmer grip on him and the excruciating flashbacks retreated into the vast blackness of his memory, Squall quickly started to feel like the biggest moron of all time. He had busted his mother's vase, gone all goddamn psycho on his new little jock friend, and now he couldn't even produce a single coherent sentence anymore.

All jokes aside – this was downright scary.

"It... uh..." he tried and failed yet again at explaining himself.

"It what, huh? And don't even think about saying 'whatever' to me, you hear? Talk to me already!"

Squall grimaced wryly at the blond's order, hating to be bossed around. That dumb fuck. Seifer was in no damn position to make demands of any nature. Why was he even trying to make the blond understand, anyway? He didn't owe him any kind of explanation. None whatsoever.

This was a complete and utter waste of his time.

_'You have no right to talk to me like that. You don't even have the right to be here. Just who the hell do you think you are?'_

"Let go..." he finally ordered in a low, semi-threatening tone that no longer sounded unstable.

The blond, however, merely shook his head in response.

"No."

"You-"

"First, I wanna know what's going on. The truth. No bullshit."

Growling, Squall tried to twist out of Seifer's grasp. When his endeavors proved to be in vain, his lips crushed to a thin, angry line and the slate blue tint of his eyes darkened a few virulent, threatening shades. Seifer noted the change and acknowledged it with frustration.

"Squall! Don't fuckin' blow me off, alright?"

"I don't even know what you want from me!" the brunette barked back, sudden resentment thriving in his heart.

He had to get away from Seifer before he'd do something that he'd later regret.

"What I want from you?" Seifer hissed, still trying to keep his voice down. "Fine, let me spell it out for you – I want to know why the fuck you always flip when I come anywhere near you! Every time I touch you, you have this epic mental freak out!"

"Maybe you shouldn't be touching me in the first place," Squall spat. "Who the fuck do you think you are, anyway?"

"Just what are you so fuckin' scared of? Huh? What is it? Tell me!"

"Nothing," Squall snapped almost hysterically – the topic of this conversation, which bordered to a full-out yelling fest, was clearly lacerating his nerves.

"Oh, is that so?" Seifer asked slyly, challenging the smaller boy in front of him. "Guess you won't mind me doing _this_ then."

With a sharp tug of his arm, Seifer pulled the brunette into him once more. When his lips collided with Squall's without warning, he could feel the brunette tensing in surprise. Still, Seifer kissed him with nearly bruising power and pinned the brunette against the wall behind him - the same one he had torn him away from only minutes before.

_'Serves him right,'_ Seifer thought dimly as he fastened his right hand around Squall's neck more tightly in order to deepen their kiss. _'He's really starting to piss me off with his attitude... I'm tired of him messing with my head... Goddamn, the little fucker tastes good though...'_

Indeed, he was tasting Squall – breathing him – and it felt so absurdly fucking good. The brunette's skin was smooth and cool as water beneath his touch, smelling faintly of soap. Moaning as he surrendered control over his rational thought, he ground his hips into the brunette's and seized each of Squall's thin wrists to press them flat against the wall. He perceived neither cooperation nor resistance from the smaller youth – not until his palms suddenly closed around those delicate, utmost wrong parts of Squall's body.

"Ungh-"

With a hitched outcry that was muffled only by Seifer's kiss, Squall managed to throw his head to the side – away from Seifer's demanding tongue and the potent, but sweet taste of coffee that still lingered there on its rasp surface. Motionless, Seifer was glaring at him out of narrow, viridian green eyes that held a gaze as hypnotic as that of a basilisk.

Rightfully petrified, Squall barely managed to govern his ability to speak.

"My... w-wrists... ugh," he forced his throat to form strenuous words, and he was relieved to find that Seifer finally understood.

"Shit!"

The burning pressure around Squall's aching wrists subsided immediately as Seifer took a hasty step backwards. Forgotten was the bitterness that had echoed between them only seconds ago; the knowledge of having caused Squall pain was enough to rid Seifer of any kind of hard feelings that he could have possibly been harboring towards the brunette.

Somehow, they each had that kind of perplexing effect on the other – anger would turn into desire that would always cause them even more anguish and frustration, which, in return, Seifer would eagerly try to alleviate, only to start the cycle all over again. Their tempers were ignited and quenched with equal ease, only to leave behind two very puzzled young men who had little to no idea how to act around each other.

"Squall," Seifer muttered, guilt streaking the beautiful name. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"It's fine."

With an almost disturbing calm ensuing that solemn reply, Squall pushed past the blond and kneeled on the floor without another word spoken. Thunderstruck, Seifer's gaze raked over the boy's blanched face as he collected shards of glass with his bare hands to pool them in his open palms.

"Squall..."

Seifer quite didn't know whether to feel angry or sad over the younger boy's distant behavior, but when he whispered the brunette's name as if he was afraid to break him by the mere use of his voice alone, Squall's right hand suddenly closed shut around one long, curved sliver piece that was once a fraction of a ridiculously expensive vase.

Hissing, Seifer quickly squatted down behind the brunette and cupped the violated hand with his own, wrenching its fingers apart. As the piece of glass connected with the floor once more, blood was oozing out of two cuts that joined the ones already caused by shoelaces tied much too forcefully.

"You idiot," Seifer breathed, the trembling words only the husk of a sound. "What the hell are you doing?"

He closed Squall's right hand to a fist and turned the left one upside down to dispose of the fragmented glass that the ivory palm had been treasuring almost dearly. Then, he pulled the brunette into a standing position, his chest spooned against Squall's back.

_'What the hell is the matter with you? I don't understand.'_

Squall stood before him like a perfect statue; only his chest was heaving in a dull rhythm. The brunette stared blankly down the hallway that stretched out in front of them – the colorful pictures, decorative stools, musical clocks and expensive oriental rugs.

Was this really what his own, personal nightmare looked like...?

What it felt like?

His hand stung slightly. The blond's strong arm around his waist, however, was almost unbearable. If he had ever truly felt like ending his own life, it was right then, that very moment, when he was burdened with emotions that he could no longer understand nor stomach. He would have gladly given in to Seifer's caring, protective nature and accepted the gentle caresses that the blond doled out so willingly... hadn't he known that it was impossible to permit sentiments like love while shutting out the memories of what had been done to him throughout the years before Seifer's appearance – or rather, what was still being done to him now. Those recollections came pouring in to him like black water over a golden seashore, luring everything good and nice into destruction.

Not that he had ever been the type of guy to build beach castles or write "I Love You's" in the sand.

"You can let go," he informed the taller boy matter-of-factly, emphasizing the emotionless order by shifting in his restricted position.

"At this rate, you'll wind up dead if I do," Seifer murmured close to his ear, sending inevitable shivers to ripple across Squall's skin at an excruciatingly slow speed.

_'... I was already dead long before I met you.'_

"... Whatever. Don't be ridiculous."

He ignored that flame of anguish licking through his mind and took a determined step towards his door, frowning when he felt Seifer resisting and pulling him back.

"Squall, wait, I..."

Seifer paused, wanting to choose his words carefully. What exactly was this unknown feeling blazing inside his chest, elicited by the very smell and touch of Squall's frail body against his own? He had noticed it before when in the other boy's presence, very subtly and never with anyone else, but something about it had definitely changed.

It was as if things had suddenly become very, _very_ serious.

_'I think I...'_

"Look, my mother's waiting and I have to clean this up, so get off me."

Squall was as chilling as he was beautiful. He snapped his right hand around to loosen Seifer's grip on it and slipped out of the blond's captivating hold as if it was nothing. Had he turned around, he might have wondered at the hurt and resignation that had dimmed the ungodly green of Seifer's eyes, but he suppressed what little interest he held in the blond's feelings. Instead, he finally pulled down on the handle of his door and decisively pushed the black surface away from himself for it to swing open in a quiet, almost foreboding half circle.

"... Come in or stay out. I couldn't care less either way."

Seifer watched him disappearing inside the room with an odd sense of unhappiness clawing at his heart. Squall's coldness affected him far more than it had before, and his constantly changing attitude was enough to confuse the blond for two lifetimes. For just one moment, he seriously debated whether to carry on with his quest for Squall's trust or turn around and never look back, but some wiser part of him already knew that he had gone just a little too far to ever turn back without finding out what lay behind the dark, almost impenetrable pathway to Squall's life and past.

Thus, he followed the boy, fine glass crunching beneath the soles of his sneakers as he treaded lightly across the hardwood floor. When he finally set foot on soft, pale grey carpet, he let out a small sound of surprise.

Squall's room was huge; in fact, it was about twice the size of Seifer's living-room. Light streamed through four floor-length, west-facing windows right across from him, framed by pull-down blinds and white curtains that fluttered in a quiet breeze. A rotating leather chair and a long, aluminum desk were positioned right in front of those blinding sources of light, and the gleaming silver surface of the desk was laden with a closed laptop, stacks of books and numerous sketches that were secured only by glass paperweights refracting the sunlight in intricate rainbow waves. Squall had stepped up to the black office chair and spun it around slowly, an odd expression on his face that Seifer could merely study in profile.

"You've got... a nice room..." the blond commented in an awestruck voice as his gaze traveled to the pale walls on his right and left.

Apparently, Squall had randomly pinned up unfinished sketches and framed photographs, as well as fleeting snapshots of wild animals and landscapes. Of course, nothing about Squall was random in any sense or form, but Seifer could see no pattern in the way that those countless pictures were scattered across the ivory colored wallpaper.

Then, his attention was diverted by two half-open doors which seemed to lead to a separate bathroom and a walk-in closet. There was a long bookshelf, too, a couple of modern dressers, a small entertainment center with a TV and a granite colored couch set that was accompanied by a low coffee table. Lastly, Seifer noticed a large, queen-sized bed positioned in a corner at an odd angle between two walls, closest to the windows. Its fine aluminum framing almost drowned beneath the array of countless down pillows and white linen sheets, which were shrouding the scene in a surreal glow as the spotless fabric seemed to reflect the light.

_'Something's weird about this room. It's so damned bright... not what I had expected from him at all, aside from the fact that it's almost surgically clean. Still... I swear, there's somethin' that's totally off about it. It feels wrong somehow. I can't even really explain it. It's almost like there's too much... light. This looks like the room of someone who's terrified of darkness...'_

"I'll be right back."

Squall was cradling his right hand before his body now, and he turned away from his desk to walk through the door that joined his bedroom with the bathroom. Obviously, he'd have to tend to his fresh wounds before going back down for breakfast.

"I'll help ya," Seifer offered immediately, already taking a step forward. "I can-"

"No."

The blond froze in the flow of his motions, unable to keep a look of disappointment from passing over his handsome face as Squall severed his offer cruelly and vanished out of sight. Arrogance had returned to the brunette's voice and aura, and Seifer didn't like it one bit. He was trying so hard to be accepted as Squall's friend or, perish the thought, perhaps even more than that, but he seemed to be making no progress at all. His initial delight over the fact that Squall hadn't been grossed out by his sensual approach of the night before had long evaporated. Sure, chances were that the brunette wasn't entirely uninterested, but how much happiness could he realistically buy with that little bit of knowledge?

_'This fuckin' sucks!'_

Honestly, Seifer had never been one to wonder or question other people's sexuality; what did he care? There were enough guys and girls who would readily flirt and come home with him for a night, maybe two. A few months, hell, even a few _weeks_ ago, that simple fact had been all that his overly inflated ego had needed to pretend that everything in his life was just fine - that he was as romantically satisfied as anyone could possibly be.

Somehow, the tables had been turned on him.

He did care, much more than he liked to admit. He found himself wondering if Squall was simply scared by the fact that they were both guys; in the end, this was a likely possibility. After all, the blond was aware that not everyone handled being sexually "different" from the gross population of Galbadia as easily as he did. Then again, perhaps there was more to the brunette's fear of intimacy than met the eye. Was Squall really as distant and cold-hearted as he portrayed himself to be, or was that just an act, meant to keep people at a distance? He couldn't figure it out, and Squall would rather drop dead than tell him, which left Seifer frustrated like nothing else in his life ever had.

_'Just how did I get myself landed in this stupid shit again...? I don't even think I remember.'_

Sighing through slightly parted lips, he paced along the walls to study the drawings and photographs that lined them. Most were just arbitrary, unfinished doodles or concept sketches, but some turned out to be quite interesting. Seifer wasn't surprised to discover lions being the main subject of Squall's artistic expressions, and this amused him to an extent, but eventually, he found himself halting in front of a framed photograph and tilting his head slightly in surprise.

A much younger Squall, probably around the age of ten or so, was kneeling on a patch of grass next to a tree, while hugging a fairly large dog. Kinking his right eyebrow, Seifer moved a bit closer to the picture. The boy was doubtlessly Squall, even if his hair was a bit shorter, streaked from the sun and his skin nicely tanned. His face was illuminated by one of the sweetest smiles that Seifer had ever seen on anyone. Considering the kind of person that Squall was today, that bright laugh seemed completely out of place. The small brunette looked so cute and carefree, it truly blew Seifer's mind. How could one person change so much throughout the course of a few years?

What in the world had happened?

Frowning, he cast a look at the dog. He couldn't quite tell what breed it was, but it looked vaguely like a mix between a German shepherd and a husky. The animal's thick grey coat was dusted with specks of black and white, and judging by its bared fangs and protruding tongue, it seemed to be genuinely happy in Squall's clumsy, but dear embrace.

_'I guess this must be Griever... Funny lookin' dog. Pretty, though. I wonder if he has more pictures like this.'_

And indeed, as Seifer continued his stroll along Squall's private gallery, he came across several other photos of the same, almost intimate kind. One showed Squall with a newborn baby (which Seifer guessed to be Ellone) in his arms and a proud grin on his lips, another showed him and Ellone (at around two years or so) in warm, puffy skiing gear in the snow. Another picture portrayed baby Ell, Squall, Raine and Griever on a park bench in summer, and yet another showed an approximately fifteen year old Squall with his mother, both sitting at a table in a restaurant. That last picture was awfully crooked and out of focus, making Seifer wonder if Ell had been the one who had taken it.

Tracing it with his fingertips, he grunted softly.

"Odd..."

He took a few more steps until he stopped before the brunette's bookcase. It was piled high with books concerning school, zoology, art and computers, as well as something else that immediately caught Seifer's attention, if only because it looked so out of place.

A children's book.

It looked incredibly small, tattered and worn out, as if it had been in Squall's possession for many, many years. Intrigued, Seifer picked it up and moved it closer to his face.

"... 'The Lion and the Shooting Star'..."

Seifer whispered the title to himself quietly, while gazing upon the faded illustration of a small lion looking up into a black, star-clustered night sky. One particular star shone much brighter than the others, and eventually, Seifer realized that it also had eyes and a mouth that was curved into a smile.

"Hmm..."

The eighteen year old deemed himself to be quite past that stage where looking through children's books was considered appropriate, but he couldn't keep himself from flipping the cover open and skimming through the worn, yellow-tinted pages. He paused at random spots to read through the lines and glance at the silly drawings that always seemed to accompany the writing in these kinds of books.

_'This is silly. Why am I even looking at this?'_

Despite his reluctance, there was one part that inevitably made Seifer stop and wonder if he had perhaps underestimated the power of that little, frayed book that he was holding in his hands so thoughtlessly.

_"... 'Then the Shooting Star looked down at the Lion and said: "Don't worry, dear Lion. Ever since I was born, I have rested with the other stars in the endless skies above, forever waiting for that special day to come when I will be grown up and can finally fulfill a pure heart's desire. I've always wanted to ride the milky ways and say hello to the Moon, but more than anything have I been looking forward to making your dearest wish come true. For, you see, you are my most beloved friend and have been my very dearest ever since I've had a memory. Every night, I've looked forward to your visits, and you alone have made my life worthwhile. I've watched over you for so long, always waiting for this special day, and now my time has finally come. Granting somebody their most important wish may be a great honor, but doing so for your best friend is the greatest of them all. Therefore, don't cry for me, dear Lion – because the moment that I will descend from heaven and soar towards the earth, your wish buried deep within my heart, I will be the happiest shooting star to ever light up the sky, in this world or any other'..."_

Still staring at the bittersweet lines, his vision blurred slightly, Seifer started at the sound of footsteps behind him. Snapping the book shut, he whipped around to come face-to-face with Squall, who was looking back at him with an expression that Seifer had never seen before.

"What are you doing?" the brunette asked, his voice unusually pointed.

"Uh... eh... Just, uh, looking at your books," Seifer replied, while quickly setting the book back in its place.

Squall didn't seem too impressed by his innocent smirk, although he didn't say anything. He didn't necessarily look upset or angry... he didn't look like anything, really. A solid brick wall probably looked more emotional than Squall did as he stood there, now carefully adjusting the position of that tiny book that Seifer had returned to the shelf almost panically. When he was satisfied, he simply turned around and walked back towards the bathroom.

Seifer followed him with his eyes, not saying a word. While he had been busy examining the boy's belongings, Squall had obviously cleaned up his wounds, put on fresh jeans, a brown belt and a short-sleeved black t-shirt, as well as strapped on a pair of his leather wristbands that covered up his bandages rather nicely.

Perhaps a bit _too_ nicely.

_'Wait a minute...'_

"Squall, did you take off your bandages?"

The dark-haired boy stopped in his stride, but didn't turn. Instead, he stared into the brightly lit cubicle that was his bathroom and knitted his eyebrows together.

"So what if I did?"

Seifer hissed flatly – angrily – and his face produced a dark grimace.

"You _moron_," he barked as he took a few quick steps towards the brunette. "You're hurt! Why would you do that? It's fuckin' _stupid_, you hear me!"

"Call it whatever the hell you want."

Shrugging coolly, Squall disappeared out of Seifer's sight. For a second, the blond considered going after him. He just didn't understand it – did Squall _enjoy_ hurting himself? What the hell was wrong with that guy? Squall made no sense to him whatsoever; Seifer had no idea what went on inside the seventeen year old's head. Whenever he thought that he had some kind of understanding of the dark haired kid's state of mind, Squall always did a complete 180 on him, as if to keep him confused and guessing.

It was so fucking tiring.

Growling, Seifer darted a series of quick, aggressive looks around the room. He didn't want to lose his temper, but _goddamn_ it was difficult. At this point in time, if he could have physically forced the truth out of Squall, he probably would have. He would have made the brunette tell him everything; why he was so scared, so unattached to his own life and why he wouldn't even give the blond so much as a whiff of a chance when it came to the two of them and their very odd relationship.

_'I'm fuckin' trying here, but he's so fuckin' difficult! What's his problem? For fuck's sake, throw me a bone here!'_

To his surprise, Squall walked back out towards him, the red shirt folded neatly in his hands. He halted a few feet in front of Seifer, giving the blond a lowbrow look.

"I'll wash your shirt and give it back to you in school on Monday."

Seifer frowned at the cold remark, which clearly implied that Squall wanted nothing to do with him until after the weekend was over, before he heaved a careless shrug.

"I don't care," he replied nonchalantly. "You can keep it."

Squall snorted in response, arrogance interlaced with the coarse sound.

"Why would I want to do something like that?" he asked snidely.

"I don't know," Seifer bit back in defense. "Why would you?"

"I wouldn't."

With that, Squall trudged away from him again. When he returned from the bathroom, he was no longer holding on to Seifer's shirt. The cold blankness hadn't yielded from his face by even a little... it was a sight that Seifer could no longer stand.

No more, no longer. It was driving him insane.

"You know," he started as he languidly paced towards the brunette, careful not to advance too fast, "You don't have to keep doing this anymore. I get it. I know you're scared. But it's alright."

Squall narrowed his eyes, surprised over the blond's change of mood, and he wearily studied Seifer's movements. Then, he plunged his hands into the pockets of his jeans and breathed a quiet, cynic laugh.

"Oh, please. What would someone like _you_ know about me or what I'm scared of?"

Contrary to Squall's calculations, Seifer didn't flip at the derisive comment. Instead, he forced himself to smile.

"Not much, I'm afraid, since you're about as communicative as a fuckin' tombstone," he murmured softly. "All the same... it's going to be alright, because you've got me on your side now, princess. I won't let anyone hurt you... not even yourself."

Inevitably, Squall's eyes snapped wide at that bold declaration. He watched Seifer walking up to him at an excruciatingly slow pace, and for some reason, the sight struck fear into his heart.

"W-wait..."

"I don't know why you always have to turn into such a gigantic asshole," Seifer continued stoically as he kept walking, "But it's really unnecessary. I'm not out to hurt you, okay? I just want to get to know you. That's all I ever wanted."

Before he could have trapped Squall between himself and the bathroom door, the brunette hastily tried to slip past him, his face white as chalk. As Squall closed in on the bedroom door, he suddenly found himself flung around by a strong hand that had grabbed his biceps and severed his stride. Snarling, he wanted to lash out at Seifer, but something in the blond's eyes stopped him. It was some kind of sadness that he had never expected to find there.

"You really hate me, don't you?" Seifer asked quietly, the inflection in his voice somewhere between hurt and amused.

Squall broke their eye contact and dropped his gaze to the floor. He glared at the carpet almost desperately, watching the complex play of sunlight on its uneven surface, and his throat was burning as he forced his tongue to produce a single, faltering word.

"... Yeah."

Squall's response was transparent as glass and the lie within it completely evident. There were several people that Squall had encountered throughout his life of whom he could genuinely say that he 'hated' them – Seifer, however, wasn't one of them. It had nothing to do with the fact that he had only known the blond for a mere five days; generally, Squall could determine whether he despised somebody or not in a simple matter of seconds.

To decide whether he liked somebody was a whole different story, however.

_'I don't. I don't. I don't... I... I **can't**!'_

He banished Seifer's presence into the back of his mind and clenched his eyes shut. When the blond saw the wounded look on his face, he sighed softly. Of course he knew that Squall didn't hate him; the brunette could be mule-headed and sensitive to a fault, but despite his behavior, he couldn't hide the fact that he harbored some kind of feelings for Seifer.

The precise nature of those feelings, though, was something that the blond still needed to figure out.

He said nothing as he stepped up to Squall and carefully wrapped his arms around him, pretending that the brunette had never admitted to hating him. The slender boy went stiff in the embrace, but Seifer didn't mind. The urge to yell and break shit over Squall's reclusive behavior had already ebbed away; perhaps he was getting used to it, he couldn't quite say. In any case, ever since he had set foot in the brunette's house and his room in particular, some part of him had realized that Squall was behaving the way he did for a very good reason.

_'I honestly have no clue what's wrong with you or your life, but anyone who feels this fuckin' good deserves to be treated right. I'm not gonna turn on you, no matter what you tell me. I'm better than that.'_

When Squall felt those strong arms encircling him, wrapping around his waist and shoulders with so much incredible patience and gentleness, understanding finally rippled through his mind like a peaceful lake that had been stirred by a rock thrown into its depths, changed forever by something so small and seemingly insignificant.

_..: "You really hate me, don't you?" :.._

His eyes snapped wide open and his heart was aching inside his chest when he recalled the ridiculous answer that he had given to that question.

_..: "Yeah." :.._

He had lied.

He had lied to Seifer and himself, hoping that somehow, his lies would become reality.

But that wasn't the case.

'_I'm such a... fool... Maybe he doesn't know it yet... but he will... In the end, he's far from stupid. I can tell that he's getting ideas. If I keep sticking around him, he'll notice... He'll realize what I'm doing, what's going on... He said he's on my side, he said he wouldn't hurt me, but... he doesn't know me... he doesn't know what kind of person I am... what I...'_

All those happy, sweet emotions that had been elicited by Seifer's adept words and touches came pouring into him now, but they left him feeling hollow and sad like nothing else in his life ever had. That strong hand, pressing against the small of his back so perfectly... it was too much, and at the same time, it wasn't enough. The realization of how he felt and what he would have to do made him want to break down and cry.

He didn't hate Seifer. He never had. He never would.

Never.

Squall wanted to squash that thought, but he couldn't. He couldn't pretend that Seifer didn't feel nice, despite everything. He couldn't pretend that the blond's endeavors didn't move him or didn't make him question his own ways.

They did, and yet, it made no difference.

Because it couldn't.

_..: "Tell me, Squall... how much do you think you're worth, hm? A silly little boy with a boring whore for a mother and a father who doesn't want you. Why, your mom practically sold her body, and you... you have so much to make up for. It's almost laughable in a way. Though, I suppose you do have a nice body. That's about all you're good for, isn't it? Well, I guess as long as you still provide me with some kind of satisfaction, I can let your dear mommy live her fairytale a little while longer. So... just how much pain exactly is **she** worth, Squall? How much humiliation? Tell me... because I'd really like to know." :.._

Grinding his teeth together slow and hard until his jaw was aching, he nuzzled his head into the crook of Seifer's neck and, for the very first time, he reciprocated the blond's hug. His arms slipped from Seifer's embrace and slowly traveled along the archs of his broad back and shoulders, where they eventually pulled tight. He dug his fingers into the thick, olive green fabric of Seifer's shirt, clawing for forgiveness as he tried to steady his breathing and silence the hurtful voice in his mind that constantly reminded him of how little importance his wishes and happiness really were.

_..: "If you squeal, I'll ruin you. I'll ruin you and everyone who's important to you, including your little sister. You know I can and you know I will." :.._

As he waged his options, vague hope still clinging to his despairing heart, he finally realized that he had never had a chance to begin with.

_'I'm sorry, Seifer... I can't.'_

And with that, he pulled away.

* * *

The title and the little snippet from Squall's book were thought of and written by me, so no copyright violations or anything of that sort. I doubt I'll ever flesh out the entire concept in all its details, but the story will pop up every now and then.


	14. Not A Child

-:-**  
Chapter 14  
Not A Child Now**

_"Hail, Sir Glaresalot."_  
-:-

I am not a child now

I can take care of myself

I mustn't let them down now

Mustn't let them see me cry

I'm fine, I'm fine

I'm too tired to listen

I'm too old to believe

All these childish stories

There is no such thing as faith and trust and pixie dust.

_"I'll Try" – Jonatha Brooke_

-:-

Pivoting on the spot in an almost perfect half circle, feeling the soothing touch of strong hands fading like a shadow from the concave curve of his waist, Squall distanced himself from the young man who was neither his enemy, nor friend, nor lover. To tag the blond with such definitive labels would have been far too troublesome and much too complex of a burden, anyhow – one that Squall was definitely not willing to shoulder. Naturally, he harbored an unspoken preference concerning those three particular options, but unfortunately, he believed that this choice was not one for him to make.

'_Like I ever had a choice in my entire fucking life...'_

Eyes of unreadable grey narrowed momentarily and ventured around the room until they locked unto the vacant, black surface of the TV screen. Squall's focused but unseeing gaze lingered there for a while, reliving the sting of a past that was as fresh as the cut furrowed into the flesh of his palm, when the shallow pain of something digging into his left biceps finally registered with his mind.

'_Seifer.'_

Of course, who else would it have been? There was nobody else in the room aside from Seifer and the invisible, blood starved demons that would forever haunt and torture Squall, day and night, for the rest of his life that was still to come. The brunette thought it a redundant gesture to turn around and face his classmate, or perhaps even a scary one in a way; in any case, he would've rather avoided any kind of visual contact.

"Squall."

The thin line of Squall's mouth hardened as every fraction of his being cringed over the sound of his own name. He arched away from the other boy's hand in a half-hearted attempt at escape, but Seifer didn't bargain so cheaply and only wrung Squall's arm more tightly in return. The blond didn't exert near enough pressure to inflict pain upon his younger companion, but nonetheless, Squall bristled against the physical contact like a stray animal against captivity.

Seifer frowned when he felt tone muscles contracting beneath skin that was smooth and cold as marble – Squall was trying to make a break for it, again. Perhaps Seifer should have expected as much, and he probably had, but it made Squall's behavior no easier to deal with.

"Where are you going?" Seifer asked, willing the coloring of his voice to remain neutral for the moment.

He saw Squall's neck shifting slightly as his chin edged sideways in a gesture of reluctance, and the brunette didn't turn to meet his gaze.

'_Where am I going? What a stupid question. Away from you. Away from everything. Do I really need to lay it out for you? Don't make it harder than it already is.'_

"... Nowhere."

The corners of Seifer's mouth curved upwards upon hearing that stone cold reply and at the way that Squall was evading him so pathetically, but the smile on his lips never reached the hypnotic green of his eyes.

"You're running away," Seifer stated sedately. "It's pretty obvious, really."

A toneless laugh, bleached of any sense of humor, was the sole feedback that his remark managed to coax out of the brunette. Then, Squall pushed forward, trying to take yet another step away from Seifer, but the blond was rooting him to the spot with the unyielding fortitude of a rock. Finally, the brunette straightened his back and snapped his chin into the air in a laughable pretense of pride, before he turned towards the older boy with the darkest and coldest of eyes.

Seifer only studied him calmly, retaining a sense of control over the situation that Squall had lost long ago.

"Stop talking nonsense. I have no reason to run away," the brunette bit, forcing a cool edge into his voice as he cleared a few astray strands of hair from his sight with a curt flick of his long fingers.

Seifer nodded in response, making no sound. His hand was still curled around Squall's biceps, consequently keeping them less than an arm's length apart.

"That's exactly right," he drawled languidly, before he suddenly yanked the brunette towards himself, until their bodies were almost touching and he could gaze down into those fogged up orbs of grey blue that suddenly lit up with surprise. "You don't. So why are you running _anyway_?"

Lacing his eyebrows together, Squall snorted at the challenging tone that accompanied that question.

"You're so goddamn full of yourself, Almasy," he sneered, fully meaning for the words to sting. "You think you're such a know-it-all, but you don't know a fucking thing."

An outraged gasp stole from the tip of his tongue when Seifer took hold of his other arm as well and connected their bodies by the chest with yet another forceful tug.

"Yeah, you know, maybe you're right," the blond affirmed while breathing evenly unto the milky patch of skin close to Squall's ear. "But in any case, I'd much rather deal with the situation as it is than simply turn around and run away with my tail between my legs."

Squall's eyes flared with quickly incensed anger and his voice rose distinctly in pitch when he spoke. "Are you calling me a coward?"

"No," Seifer replied simply, shaking his head.

"Then back the fuck off!"

The blond's lips eased into the tiniest of smiles – a gesture that was situated somewhere between jeer and kindness, Squall couldn't quite tell for sure, but either way he didn't like it.

"Don't fuck with me!" he spat, the words coming out more hysterical sounding than he would've liked.

"I'm not fucking with you," Seifer soothed, feeling Squall's chest heaving harshly against his own as the boy drew sharp breaths through gnashed teeth. "Tsk. Honestly... You know, _I _should be the one worrying about being mind-fucked here. Two minutes ago, you were clinging to me as if hugs were goin' out of style, and now you don't even wanna look at me! If you've got some kind of split personality problem, I'd really love knowin' about it right fuckin' now."

"Fuck you!"

With vicious determination, Squall attempted to break out of Seifer's intimate grasp. His earlier need to be held and touched by the older youth had long evaporated, and even if the wish of being close to him _hadn't_, he would never submit to that pitiful stain of _need_ that was digging deep inside his heart. What he truly needed was distance between him and Seifer, as much of it as possible - for as long as it would take for the stubborn blond to finally give up.

But give up _what_, exactly?

'_... Until he gives up trying to annoy the crap out of me. Until he gives up trying to lecture and... befriend me. Until he gives up on everything that has to do with me. Yeah... it's that goddamn simple, I promise you.'_

Squall might have sounded perfectly callous and uncaring, yet the prospect of Seifer leaving him felt like a punch into his chest. Nothing in his life had been easy, that much was for certain, but to push Seifer away would be one of the hardest tasks he'd ever have to see through.

'_I really am pathetic...'_

A vicious, blindsiding pain had begun to pierce the space behind his forehead, but he disregarded the annoying sensation as best as he could. With a sigh, he realized that Seifer was still firmly holding their bodies together, as if that desperate embrace was going to change anything at all. In reality, it did nothing but complicate matters for the brunette.

"Squall. Do you really think I'm just fuckin' with you...?"

Unconsciously, Squall flinched at the question and Seifer's fading breath that still tingled across the nape of his neck. As much as he hated to admit it, Seifer was completely right – because in the end, the brunette couldn't possibly bring himself to believe that a handsome, careless jock like Seifer would ever harbor any serious interest in him.

And if he _did_...?

'_It makes no difference. **None**. None at all.'_

Even though his heart was in a concerning state of imbalance, the pale skinned boy shrugged softly and scrunched up his nose as if he had not a single worry in the world.

When he spoke, a desperate sneer was creeping to his lips. "No. I don't really care either way. It's whatever, really."

He could almost hear the remainder of Seifer's patience ticking away, slowly perhaps, but ticking all the same. Squall knew perfectly well that each carelessly muttered "whatever" grated over the blond's nerves like nails on a chalk board. In the end, he figured, it would simply be a matter of time before Seifer would snap just like everyone else before him had.

Apparently, however, that "time" hadn't come just yet, because Seifer neither walked out on him nor punched him to the ground in annoyance. All he did was stand there, producing some kind of unsettling smile that thoroughly irritated the brunette.

"That's what it is, isn't it?" Seifer noted with a drawl of satisfaction, as if he had finally unveiled the source of Squall's odd behavior. "You really think I'm just playing with you. That's why you're being so goddamn uptight. You think I'm out to fuck you over, and you're scared."

If Seifer had expected fanfares and confetti for his brilliant discovery, he had to have been utterly disappointed. Squall's meager acknowledgement of his theory was a mocking, almost commiserating snort. Frankly, the brunette wasn't the least bit surprised that Seifer's train of thought would run in such simple, predictable tracks. In the end, he _was_ just another dumb football jock.

Chuckling through half-parted lips, he inched backwards to face Seifer down, a frosty glint sparking in his strident grey orbs that were harder than steel.

"Don't flatter yourself. To be honest, I really don't give a shit about you _or_ your intentions."

Without giving any kind of physical or vocal warning, he swatted the blond's arms away to step to the side, and this time, Seifer let him go. Perhaps he had been insulted by the brunette's hurtful reply, or he had simply grown tired of sandwiching them together – either way, it was of little interest to Squall. Raking a slender hand through his disheveled hair, he took a few quick strides away from Seifer and towards the door. He was mildly astonished when the blond did nothing to stop him, but on the other hand, it suited him just fine.

'_Not like this whole thing isn't already tedious enough.'_

Seifer watched him disappearing from the room, quite unsure of what to think or do. A small, disgruntled frown creased his brows at the thought of Squall obviously giving less than two shits and a giggle about hurting him. What the hell was his problem, anyway? Earlier, he had seemed fairly mild mannered and almost pleasant. It was a far cry from the brunette's current behavior, that much was for certain. Squall's abrupt mood changes always managed to throw Seifer completely off balance, no matter how much he thought he was mentally prepared for them by now. Perhaps the brunette really _was_ just a little bit frightened and a whole lot insecure, or then again, perhaps he just genuinely didn't care whose feelings he trampled over. For the time being, Seifer could rule out neither of those options.

Grunting, he rolled his shoulders in a shrug and shook his head with a subdued grunt.

"... Pissy little brat."

Whistling some falsely cheery tune and acting more acquiescent than he felt, he tracked down his dark haired companion in the hallway outside the bedroom. Squall was kneeling on the hardwood floor, dust pan and broom already in hand. The seventeen year old was sweeping up fragments of broken glass and hackled white flowers with fierce, nervous movements and his typical scowl firmly in place.

Sighing, Seifer tilted his head sideways and submerged his hands in the pockets of his shorts as he leaned smugly against the door frame.

"You want help or what?" he asked gruffly.

With the demure tacitness of a tomb, Squall shot the blond a long, icy glare that cut through him with the poignancy of invisible daggers.

"Well goodness gracious my love, guess I'll take that as a no," Seifer noted with a roll of his eyes.

Squall said nothing. Instead, he devoted all of his attention to his broom and pan as if it they were the single most interesting things in the world. Seifer watched him from his position by the door with a scrutinizing eye. Occasionally, he'd see an air of impatience and annoyance pass over the brunette's face at the concept of being stared at, but Squall managed to finish his cleaning task without cracking a single sound or looking back at Seifer even once. His silence was quite an accomplishment, really, considering that he was squatting mere inches from the blond's feet and his slashed wrists were burning raw with white hot pain beneath the leather bands when performing even the simplest of movements.

Finally, after he had removed even the tiniest specks of glass from the freshly waxed surface of the wooden floor boards, Squall rose back to full height. His short intake of breath and the way his forearm instinctively fluttered across his face gave him a look of exhaustion. Seifer realized this, of course, but his dark haired classmate had already replaced his vacant mask and brushed past him to rid himself of the broken vase by dumping it into the garbage can in his bathroom. Squall's used bandages were in there, too, concealed beneath extensive tufts of toilet paper. He wasn't worried about his mother or the maid discovering them since he usually emptied his trash on his own, but he also thought it better to be safe than sorry.

When Squall returned after the completion of his task, he found Seifer still folded nonchalantly against the door and watching him out of the corner of his intense peridot eyes. The brunette ignored the probing look-over and returned his cleaning tools to the broom closet down the hallway. He wasn't quite sure how he was possibly going to survive a family breakfast scenario involving Seifer Almasy, but all of his escape routes had been severed at this point in time.

Truthfully, there was no path left for him to take but the one that lead straight forward.

"Let's go," he ordered crisply, letting on nothing about his fragile state of both his body and mind. "She's waiting."

After a moment of silence, Seifer finally pried himself from his position by the wall, his hands still tucked into his pockets. Squall stood at the top of the stairs and watched him approaching with an air of wariness in his posture. The blond's eyes were glued to his own silvery blue ones in a passionate sense of focus, never straying once. That hypnotic gaze sent spikes of heat through Squall's veins, making his knees go just a little bit weak. One calculated look from Seifer's eyes could cause the world to tilt – Squall's world, more precisely – and it scared the brunette much more than any pain-induced or blood-fortified threat of his stepfather's ever had.

Letting out a small gasp, Squall quickly veered his head around to glare down the staircase. His hand reached for the rail to wrestle it for much needed support, but before his fingers could have reached the smooth wood, his elbow had bumped into something strangely solid.

"Whatcha waitin' for?"

Retracting his hand, Squall glanced across his shoulder. Seifer was smirking down at him, cocky as ever. Huffing, Squall quickly strode down the carpeted stairs.

"Not for _you_, that's for damn sure," he snapped back, his inflection cruel.

He pretended not to hear Seifer's content growl of laughter and marched on ahead downstairs. Inwardly, he was shaking with stress. The sound of Seifer's footsteps padding behind him was both soothing and unnerving in an almost perverse manner.

He hated it so much he could barely breathe.

Perhaps Seifer was right, at least in some aspect; Squall certainly was _not_ suffering of a multiple personality disorder, but even so, he seemed to have strayed closer to the brink of insanity than ever before. He knew what he had to do and had developed a vague concept of how to go about it, but something inside of him was screaming at the mere thought of being alone once more. It wasn't even so much the wish of being with just anyone, either – after all, he had learned to repress his neediness concerning friendship and intimacy a long time ago. This was quite simply a sapling desire to be close to that one particular impudent, loud-mouthed blond alone.

Him, and no one else.

'_Seifer...'_

Squall shook his head in frantic denial as he calmly continued his descent.

In the end, he knew better than to ask for something he could never have.

By the time they had reached the foot of the stairs, Squall's formerly blunt headache had transformed into an agonizing migraine. He was thinking too much, of course, but it was difficult not to. The only thing that finally managed to tear him out of his stupor was Seifer's hand pressing his shoulder with a touch that was neither gentle nor firm.

"Hey. What's going through that stubborn head of your's right now, huh? You look like Christmas has been canceled."

Contrary to his grip, Seifer's words were silky and persuasive. Squall liked the rasp growl that always accompanied the other youth's tone; he actually found it quite comforting, as odd or inconvenient as that might have been.

Still, he slapped the blond's arm aside without any hint of kindness. Seifer hadn't expected much else, although the sharp lines of his face coiled all the same.

'_Pretty boy's really pushing his luck today. Why the hell am I putting up with his attitude again?'_

A glance at Squall's beautifully curved ivory neck framed by wisps of chocolate brown hair and the perfect cling of faded blue jeans against tone gluteal muscles refreshed Seifer's memory quite instantly.

'_Oh. Yeah... That's right. I almost forgot.'_

He swallowed the longing sigh from his tongue and quickly followed Squall's brisk lead. The brunette crossed the lobby and entered a seemingly random hallway that was decorated with another dozen of his hand-painted pictures. There were some photographs, too, but Seifer had no chance to study any of them more closely. In front of him, Squall had passed through a set of sliding glass panel doors and emerged in a bright, sun kissed room that Seifer recognized by its tempting smell alone.

'_Mhh... pancakes! Yum. I'm starving too, man!'_

He stopped short next to the brunette and took a curious look around. The kitchen was huge, but not at all uninviting. Expensive wooden cabinets and a marble topped cooking island contrasted interestingly with the whimsical sunflower wallpaper and the terracotta tiled floor. The warm, homely scent emitted from a cast iron skillet that Squall's mother was shifting around on a professional looking gas stove had Seifer sighing with rapture.

"That smells awesome!" he exclaimed blithely, causing Raine to turn and look at him in surprise.

"Oh, there you are," she noted contently. "I hope you're hungry, you two. Go on, have a seat!"

She motioned towards the large dining table situated right by a number of floor-length windows that granted an extensive view of the beautiful stone patio outside. Even from his current position, Seifer could spot a set of teak furniture and a huge yellow parasol swaying softly in the breeze as it dispensed shade to the birds hopping about, picking crumbs from some preceding meal and day.

"I figured we'd better eat inside since there's a lot of bees out around the patio," Raine explained as she noticed Seifer's interest. "I think there might be a nest somewhere, Squall. Your dad said he'd take a look at it when he comes home from the golf course, so please stay away from the porch until then."

The brunette stiffened immediately, but nobody aside from Seifer seemed to have acknowledged that blatant change in Squall's posture. Then again, Seifer thought, perhaps he was just seeing things.

"That's fine," Squall suddenly growled in an almost insulted tone. "You don't need to wait for him. I'll do it after breakfast."

Saying nothing further, he walked over to the table and sank into the corner bench. After a moment of hesitation, Seifer followed him and picked a spot to the brunette's right. The bench was awfully comfy and he found himself bouncing in the cushions in playful excitement – well, until he caught a sideway glimpse of a particularly intimidating version of Squall's death glare, anyway.

'_... And thus, from this day forth, he shalt be known as Sir Glaresalot, the pissed off brat who laid waste to a thousand men with his crankiness alone! Hail, Sir Glaresalot!'_

"... What's so fucking funny?"

He blinked as that hissed question diced his colorful imagination. Apparently, his treacherous lips had stretched into a very wide, toothy grin without his own awareness as he had pondered the brunette's royal bitchiness. Squall looked less than pleased over his giddy expression, so he wiped the smirk from his face and replaced it with an air of most misleading innocence.

"Huh? Oh, nothin'. Nothin' at all," he lilted.

'_Whaddayaknow, Glaresalot's on to me. I better lay low or he'll glare off my arm and snack on it like the vicious lil thing he is. Cannibalism's the last thing I'd put past his treacherous ass. Hm... I kinda wonder if I taste any good with syrup and butter? Man, I think I'd rather sample **him** instead. I'd have to slather some ice cream on him first to cool down the bitchiness a bit, though. So then, on today's menu: Glaresalot A La Mode!'_

This time, the blond couldn't keep himself from busting out in full blown laughter. He tried to keep the volume to the barest minimum by snorting in his closed mouth rather than laughing in the open, but regardless of his efforts, Squall seemed prepared (and all too willing) to shove his entire set of silver wear up his nose.

Luckily, Seifer was saved by Raine placing a foot-high pile of pancakes on the table before them.

"What are you two laughing about?" she asked serenely and brushed back her long, brown hair with a curious smile.

Apparently, she had overlooked the murderous glint in Squall's eyes.

'_It's not "you two" who's laughing, it's **him**! That fucking psycho. God only knows what his sick brain is working up this time.'_

Issuing a vague grunt, Squall sunk his fork into the pile of thick, warm pancakes and slapped five of them on Seifer's plate. There were bowls of fruit, a pitcher with orange juice, a tub of whipped cream and some maple syrup, too, all of which the brunette shoved across the table into his companion's direction.

"Help yourself," he bit grimly, making it sound more like an invitation to lob Seifer off the nearest bridge rather than an offer to make himself at home.

"Aww, you're being awfully grumpy this morning, honey," his mother chided immediately, before ruffling his tousled head in a loving gesture. "Seifer, sweetie, do you want anything else? Coffee maybe?"

"Nah, I'm good. OJ is perfect. Thanks, Miss Leonhart."

The beautiful brunette smiled again. "Just Raine."

"Oh, right..."

Seifer liked that name. Raine... It suited her, really. The blond's own mother was called Elaine Cassandra Almasy; a rightfully sophisticated name, mind you. His mother was a smart, successful woman, and deep down, Seifer knew that she loved him, but they'd always had a strained relationship. Raine, on the other hand, was the kind of person who naturally made anyone feel happy and at ease.

'_Too bad she didn't pass any of that on to her hot son, eh?'_

Grinning, Seifer drowned his pancakes in a sea of syrup and mountains of fruit. Just the sweet scent alone was making him so fucking hungry! Squall, on the other hand, didn't seem to be too fond of sugary condiments. He was eating his pancakes dry with some chopped walnuts and strawberries, looking fashionably gloomy.

"Oy, Squall, are ya watchin' your petite lil' figure, or what?" Seifer teased as he happily stuffed his face and nudged his friend into the side with the tireless enthusiasm of a puppy dog. "You could use some meat on your bones, ya know. You're pretty skinny."

Critically, Squall surveyed the blond's impressive stack of food and produced a chortling sound, low in his throat.

"Some of us don't wanna die an early, sugar induced death, thanks."

"It'd be a sweet death, anyhow," Seifer countered, licking his fork with a sultry grin.

"Moron."

Munching his pancakes and nursing his glass of juice, Seifer eventually shifted his focus to Raine, who had returned to the stove to prepare another batch of her sinfully good breakfast treat. It was then that he was struck by the realization that someone important was missing.

'_Uh... where's his sister, anyway?'_

As if Squall had read that question from the canvas of his mind, the brunette narrowed his eyes after he had swallowed a small sip of orange juice and finally raised his voice above its usual level of monotony.

"Mom, where's Ell?"

"Oh, she went to use the bathroom. I think she wanted to go up to her room to get something as well," Raine replied lightly, before winking at Seifer. "I'm afraid she's really excited to show you her Barbie collection, Seifer. She seemed rather impressed with your knowledge of the Barbie Dream House."

"Really..." Seifer drawled, laughing roughly. "Well, it's one pink architectural disaster, but I s'pose I can understand her fascination. If I was Ken, I'd move my ass right the fuck in! Eh... uh, 'scuse me. That kinda slipped out."

Raine, however, seemed not outraged but amused by his genuine embarrassment.

"Haha," she laughed. "That's alright, sweetie - just don't let Ell hear it, she has a remarkable memory when it comes to four letter words. We really have to watch it around her."

Next to Seifer, Squall had stopped picking at his food and was glancing at the blond with narrowed eyes, which had lit up with curiosity.

"How do you know so much about all this Barbie stuff, anyway? Do you have a sister or something?" he asked calmly, quite despite his usual, indifferent self.

"No, I'm an only child," Seifer elaborated readily. "A girl I dated a couple years ago was into the whole collector's thing. Had her entire room plastered with Barbies."

Squall's eyes widened with interest, and Seifer cracked a wry grin. "Well, it was a lil creepy if you ask me," he said, while performing a twirling motion with his pointer finger, very close to his right temple. "Girlfriend was a lil on the koo-koo side."

To his surprise, Squall hastily returned his gaze to his plate without offering any kind of reply – not even so much as an ill-tempered grunt. From her position by the stove, Raine watched with subtle interest how cool, green eyes were now boring into the rigid profile of her son, looking adorably confused and silently pleading for some kind of elaboration on Squall's sudden sour expression.

This Seifer... she knew near nothing about him, but there was something about the way that he gazed at Squall and interacted with him that seemed rather peculiar. In any case, she didn't find herself disliking it; he was the first person that Squall had brought home in years, let alone had a sleep-over with, and that was plenty of reason to make Seifer a boy who was naturally dear to her heart.

"Squallie! Seifie!"

Seifer almost choked on his pancake when the tiny brunette that was Squall's sister came tripling into the kitchen with one purple plastic horse and at least five Barbies and Ken dolls plus accessories pooled in the small space between her crossed arms. Even Squall gave a hoarse cough, before he jumped up from his seat to rush to her assistance.

"Ell, what are you doing?" he asked with incredulity, though he could predict her answer perfectly well.

"Seifie said... Seifie said he wanted to see my Barbies!" she squealed, slightly out of breath as she supervised very closely how her brother placed her precious toys on the kitchen table.

"... His name is Seifer," the brunette corrected her delicately, grimacing as if he had taken a square bite out of a lemon.

Ellone regarded her older sibling with a look that suggested neither understanding nor interest. Literally ignoring Squall's lecture concerning her new friend's proper name, she happily climbed up on the bench and scooted into the seat next to Seifer's, beaming as she was holding the violently purple Barbie horse into the air by one of its hind legs.

"Look, Seifie," she commanded, pleased to see that Seifer immediately obeyed. "This is Six."

"Six?" the tall youth asked, tilting his head in a funny angle. "Uh... That's a great name, Ell, but why Six?"

Shrugging, she pushed the horse into the blond's arms. She was still trying to untangle her short legs beneath her on the bench, but finally she had settled into a somewhat comfortable position. Seifer studied the horse with interest that seemed so genuine that it even fooled a skeptic Squall, who had sank back down by the older teen's other side and was monitoring the scene warily. He wasn't sure how much he liked Ellone's obvious infatuation with Seifer – no, actually, he _knew_ that he _didn't_ like it. His sister wasn't accustomed to him bringing over friends and he certainly wasn't planning of turning this one-time event into a habit. He thought himself more clever than that.

In the end, friends and romance were both luxuries that he could not afford.

Ell, however, was elated over having bonded with someone who was taller than three feet and didn't get food all over himself when he ate, like most of her other male friends usually would. She excitedly gathered all of her toys around Seifer's plate and accidentally dunked Tea Party Ken head-first into a bowl of whipped cream. On second thought, however, she really seemed to fancy the idea, because she quickly had Shopping Spree Barbie join her plastic bodied companion on his involuntary trip to dairy land.

"Ell, what are you _doing_?"

She looked up at her mother's cry of disbelief, her big brown eyes naïve and innocent as ever.

"They're hungry, too," she explained patiently while stirring Ken in determined circles, wearing a sweet smile. "Right, Seifie?"

Seifer, who was desperately trying not to laugh despite his ribs threatening to crack from the strain, could hear Squall next to him choking on his pancake with surprise. Even the serious brunette seemed humored by his sister's silly antics, because there was a cute sparkle in his eyes and a rare twitch by the corners of his pale red lips that could easily be taken for a smile.

Their mother, of course, wasn't quite as amused. Sighing, she took Ken and Barbie from a pouting Ell's hands and relocated them, together with the whipped cream, to the sink.

"Ell, sweetie, you _know_ you're not supposed to play with your food. If Ken and Barbie are hungry, go feed them in your kitchen in your room – _after_ breakfast!"

With that, she placed a glass of milk for her daughter and more pancakes for all three of her protégées on the table. She watched how Seifer put Six aside and ladled a pancake on Ell's plate, carefully so, before politely offering her some maple syrup.

"Syrup, Miss Ellone?" the tall blond cooed in a pointed voice, while bowing as steeply as his restricted space on the bench allowed.

Giggling, she took it from him.

"Thank you, Sir Seifie," she replied blithely, unknowingly reigniting one of Seifer's stranger ideas.

"Oh yeah..." the blond started and reeled backwards slightly to grant her a better glimpse of her brother, Squall, who was glaring at both of them with open mistrust, "This right here, Milady, is Sir Glaresalot. The "sir" is just for kicks though, you see, he's actually my squire! Bit grumpy he is, ol' Glaresalot, but takes good care of the horse, armor, stinky socks and stuff. Anyway, I'm Sir Seifer, your knight, here to protect you from the dragons and bees in the garden, my fair maiden. May I kiss your hand?"

A grin passed over his lips when he noted the clatter of Squall abruptly putting down his fork.

"What the- _Sir_ _WHAT?"_

He ignored the brunette's infuriated growl and placed a couple gentlemanly kisses on Ell's tiny hand. The gesture caused a blush to conquer her pale cheeks – quite similar to Squall's, in fact, although his was unlikely born from girlish infatuation. Seifer could feel his classmate's irritation simmering off of him in heated waves, but he thought the boy's wayward temper to be rather comical.

"You're so sweet, Seifer, honestly," Raine laughed, who had finally sat down at the table as well, sipping a cup of strong coffee. "Gosh, Ell... a big brother and a chivalrous knight - what more could a little girl possibly want?"

Ellone let out an excited squeak. "... Barbies!"

"Hmm... well yes, that's true, but you have a whole room full already, cutie," her mother chided, not at all unkind, before glancing at her son. "Squall, are you finished already?"

Seifer heeded his classmate with a smug, challenging expression, eager to hear the boy's reply to his mother's question. Apparently, the brunette was still stewing over being christened "Sir Glaresalot", because he looked characteristically grim as he was picking at his food, rearranging it on his plate in strangely violent patterns. Then again, Seifer mused, maybe it was the idea of being appointed his humble squire that bothered Squall, or more likely, a little bit of both.

Little did Seifer know that Squall was not so much _angered_ by the blond's jokes as he was worried. The fact that Seifer so easily blended into his family, entertained his sister and charmed his mother caused that icy sting of panic in his heart to flare up like a torch. They _liked _him; they liked him much more than he had anticipated – than he had _feared_. Of course Seifer _was_ sweet and lovable and charming in his own, annoying ways – such had never been a point of debate.

However...

'_In the end, it doesn't matter how nice he is or how much they adore him... or how much I... anyway - it makes no difference. He's bad news for all of us, they just don't know it. They don't know **anything**, and I'll do whatever necessary to keep it that way.'_

Spearing a strawberry with the tip of his fork, Squall let out a shaky, tense breath of air. Perhaps he had looked a bit too gritty doing so, because his mother lifted her eyebrows in an expression of stunned concern.

"Squall, are you feeling alright?" she asked, leaning towards him. "What's wrong? You look strange. Squall...?"

When the brunette showed no visible reaction to those earnest inquiries, Seifer – while looking perfectly inconspicuous - gave one of Squall's shins a sharp kick beneath the table. It inflicted just enough pain to hurl Squall out of his transfixed state and drive him to furiously whisk his head around towards Seifer, who was as lofty and straight-faced as ever.

"What the f-"

Seifer severed the boy's irritated gasp by digging his heel into the top of Squall's foot, smiling serenely.

"Your mom asked you something," the blond lilted and took a calculated swig of his juice while avoiding eye contact with either of the Leonharts.

Forcing down his resentment, Squall quickly glanced from Seifer to his mother and over at Ellone, who was watching him curiously while petting one Barbie's long blond hair.

Honestly, the little girl thought, her big brother was acting more strange by the day.

"W-what, Mom?" Squall finally whispered through thin lips, which he had cambered into a pained smile as the pain in his leg nearly brought tears to his eyes. "Sorry, I didn't hear you."

"I asked if you were okay," Raine repeated slowly. "You looked so serious there for a minute."

"Oh... uh... I... I was just thinking about school. I didn't mean to zone out on you, really... Sorry."

Even though Seifer considered the brunette's act to be quite transparent, his mother readily bought into it. In fact, Squall must've said something of great interest, because her beautifully pale face, which was enhanced by only a dusting of make-up, lit up in excitement.

"Oh yes, the school festival!" she exclaimed happily. "You said you had to go in tomorrow to help paint the backdrop for the Drama Club's play, isn't that right?"

"Right..." Squall drawled in a stretched, exhausted tone of voice, before refocusing on his plate.

This was news to Seifer. He vaguely remembered their art teacher, Fujin, to demand some kind of discussion with Squall on this school festival subject, but he had never thought of asking the brunette about it. More accurately, it had completely slipped his mind. So Squall was going into school on Sunday to help out with said preparations?

... Interesting indeed.

"Are you helping too, Seifer?"

The blond veered towards Raine, grinning secretively.

"Yeah," he replied almost sweetly. "I just so might."

"I wanna help, too!" Ellone whined immediately. "I can paint, can't I, Squall?"

She had put her dolls aside and was fiercely glaring at the two older boys, looking as determined and steadfast as any five year old possibly could as her eyes sparkled like little black diamonds. In the end, Seifer decided, she truly was a spitting image of her teenage brother.

"We'll paint something later, Ell," Squall reassured her, without giving in to her claims. "Eat up already. Your food's getting cold."

She didn't much seem to like being told what to do, because her bottom lip jutted into a pout. At last, she _did_ eat her breakfast, if only because she admired Squall like no one else in the world and didn't want to upset him. He wasn't like the other grown-ups; he always had time to play with her, tell her stories and draw her the most beautiful pictures. Of course she loved her father and her mother, too, but her big brother was by far her most precious person in the world. His new friend, Seifer, was nice as well, but in a different kind of way than Squall. Not any better or worse – just different. Ellone was yet too young to fully comprehend the meaning of this, but there was one thing that was perfectly clear to her – she really, really liked Seifer's dazzling green eyes, and in her heart she knew that her big brother felt the very same way.

"I want Seifie to come play more often," she thus announced between mouthfuls of pancake, causing Seifer to beam contently and Squall to go scarlet with embarrassment.

"That's a good idea, Ell," Raine agreed. "It's so nice to have you over, Seifer! Isn't it, Squall?"

After a few seconds of his mother looking at him expectantly, the brunette finally nodded very stiffly in response, although his expression suggested rather that he wished Seifer a very painful death.

'_A good idea? You've gotta be kidding me. His stupid ass is **not** coming over again! I'll make sure of that, trust me.'_

Squall would've given anything to wipe that pleased smirk off Seifer's face, but it seemed as persistent as if it had been smacked down into concrete.

Just where exactly were those bloody jackhammers when you _really_ needed them?

'_Fuck it all.'_

Blowing a random, unruly chunk of hair out of his eyes, Squall drowned himself wholly in his self pity. The female members of his family were happily chatting away with his unwanted guest, who was strutting his stuff like a horny rooster planted in the midst of a flock of chickens in heat.

Why on earth wouldn't he just _leave_?

"Oy, Silent One!"

Seifer had elbowed him in the side demandingly, causing Squall to snarl at him in return. The blond seemed to find this amusing – like everything that Squall ever did or said.

God, was it ever _annoying_.

"Squall," Seifer cooed, apparently remembering that his classmate actually had a name, "You done or why are ya starin' holes into the air?"

"... Done," the brunette replied frigidly.

"But you've hardly eaten anything!" Raine protested. "Honestly, Squall, you need to eat more."

"Yeah, man, don't make your mother worry! You're so skinny, you're like death glares on a stick."

Squall wanted to tell Seifer to mind his own business, but resisted the urge. Knowing his mother, she'd take it as a cue to shape up his people skills, or at least give the matter an earnest try. After all, she pointed out frequently enough how she must have done _something_ wrong with her son's education, at least where his social skills (or the lack thereof) were concerned. Perhaps she had put him into kindergarten too soon? Perhaps she should have taken him to the park more often to meet with other kids his age? Perhaps she _shouldn't _have bought him that one scary video game when he was eight and really into this strange vampire thing...?

Of course, realistically, Squall's general antipathy towards human company and casual conversation had nothing to do with her, Count Dracula or even those annoying brats at the playground (oh, how he had _hated_ them, though – never in his life had he been more bored!), but Raine always placed the blame on herself instead of her children – for _everything_.

Her son knew that only too well.

"Oh well... I suppose I can't spoon-feed you anymore, can I? Hm... Seifer hun, do you want anything else?"

After his train of thought had somehow pressed on without him, Squall watched with newly erected interest how Seifer shook his head at Raine's question and patted his belly, which still looked perfectly flat beneath its sheath of olive green fabric. Then again, Squall mused, the blond was equipped with a set of fairly impressive abdominal muscles... or at least he recalled that much from the night before.

The second he realized that he was contemplating Seifer's lustrous six pack of all things, Squall wanted to melt into the ground and straight out _die_ of shame. Muttering something garbled under his breath, he hastily removed his meticulous gaze from the blond's attractive body and slid out of the bench.

"Well, why don't you two go upstairs then?" Raine suggested when she saw him getting up, causing her son to cringe.

"B-but I-"

"Ooh, can I come? Pleeease? Please?" Squall heard his sister begging in her whiniest, most convincing voice, but before he had a chance to yield to her beckoning, his mother had already taken control of the situation.

He wasn't quite sure whether to thank or condemn her for it.

"Ell, sweetie, why don't you help Mommy with the dishes?" Raine coaxed her daughter lovingly. "You know, I could use a grown lady's help. It's so much work for one woman alone."

The girl seemed to ponder this, because her small, button shaped nose was furrowed in deep thought. Ultimately, the prospect of being regarded as a "grown lady" easily triumphed over fawning over her older brother and his friend... at least for the moment being.

"Mmmh... ooo-kay, I guess."

After graciously giving in to her mother's request, Ellone scrambled out of the bench as well, now holding on tightly to Six whom she carried to the sink to check on Barbie's and Ken's condition.

"You don't want help?" Squall asked his mom while fastening one hand upon his hip, half-hoping that he wouldn't have to deal with Seifer on his own again.

"No no! Go on, you guys! Ell and I can handle it just fine."

"That's right!" Ellone confirmed loudly as she tip-toed around the sink, trying to reach the fruit-scented dish soap that she liked so much. "'Cause Mommy said I'm a big lady."

Admitting defeat at last, Squall sighed like an animal that had been sent on a trip to the slaughterhouse.

"... Fine. Whatever."

He let this be his only noticeable sign of bother as he waltzed out of the room without acknowledging Seifer's lingering presence. The blond was still lounging around quite comfortably, his arms crossed nonchalantly behind his neck, when he realized that Squall was _not _going to invite him along for the ride. It seemed as if Seifer's best bet would be to simply latch on and let the Glaresalot Express take the lead. Not his idea of fun, precisely, but he was slowly getting used to it.

Perhaps he was making this up, but as he darted after Squall and out of the kitchen, he could've sworn that Raine was gracing him with a very compassionate, pitiful smile.

'_Yep, he's a stubborn lil princess alright. Cute though, gotta give him that.'_

When he entered the lobby, he had to realize that Squall had already begun to ascend the staircase. Seifer found himself contemplating whether or not to follow the grumpy brunette, only to come to the conclusion that he really didn't have anything better to do.

'_Might as well wreck his nerves a bit more, eh? I mean, hey, the day's hardly started.'_

With a feral grin that laced a mischievous golden glow into the dark green of his eyes, Seifer lightly jogged up the stairs. Squall had apparently taken them in stride as well, because the blond could merely catch a glimpse of his friend's backside as he disappeared through the doorway of his room.

'_Tsk, tsk, tsk. You can't escape me and you know it, too.'_

Squall was already pacing madly up and down his bedroom, looking somewhat erratic as he senselessly shifted papers around on his desk and randomly rearranged his other belongings, trying hard to look preoccupied. Seifer watched him from the center of the room, one eyebrow cocked daringly, before he snorted in amusement and smugly smoothed his hair back with one hand.

"The fuck are ya doing anyway, kitten?" he asked, glinting at his prey. "Nervous, are we?"

This seemed to insult Squall (then again, what didn't?), because his gaze darkened in a threatening scowl as he half-glared across his shoulder.

"You're still here?" Squall snarled icily, no longer trying to conceal his irritation.

"Well... yeah," Seifer established with a shrug, grinning again. "Can't help it - sorry. You're just too much fun to be around."

"... Whatever."

Squall was rotating a heavy glass paperweight in his hands, barely resisting the temptation to put a permanent dent in Seifer's forehead. In the end, he simply turned his back on the blond and continued to sort through his piles of sketches, pretending that he wasn't unnerved by or even aware of his classmate's presence.

Being ignored, of course, was one of Seifer's countless pet peeves – it just rubbed him the wrong way. Although, he had to say, being able to thoroughly study Squall's beautiful, tantalizing behind did have indisputable perks... ones of the kind that Seifer very much liked to savor and that drove him to cackle softly with disconcerting glee.

Even though Squall was acting like he didn't care, he had to admit that he was at least mildly upset when he heard Seifer's feet shuffling across the carpet; the sounds were growing fainter, suggesting that the blond was finally fed up enough to leave.

'_Suits me just **fine**, okay? Fuck.'_

Surprise washed over him, however, when he noted the sound of his door being thrown shut and the lock clicking faintly as it was being engaged.

'_What the...? Did he just...?'_

More noise caused by sneakers being dragged on carpet suggested that Seifer _had_, indeed - the blond was still in the room, and apparently, he had just locked Squall's bedroom door.

Squall was standing bent over his desk, one hand wrenched around the edge of the glass top for support. Shaking inwardly, he was trying to figure out how Seifer could possibly dare to do such a thing; he wasn't willing to turn around and ask, because his cheeks had turned a brilliant shade of crimson. The very last sight that Squall would ever voluntarily grant to his blond classmate was that of him blushing like a cute little school girl, thank you very much.

In the end, he discovered Seifer's motives much sooner than he would've liked, anyhow.

The feeling of two arms coming around his chest, roping him in like flotsam, was familiar by now, but nonetheless distressing. Seifer's hands were warm and flush against his own, cold skin, massaging away his goose bumps. For a moment, Squall's breath remained frozen in his chest, tensely waiting for an attack that never came; Seifer seemed perfectly content just holding him tilted against the desk, while dusting the nape of his neck with smooth, silent kisses that suggested affection, not intrusion. Of course Squall's body was reacting to that touch, quite naturally so; he was starting to feel slightly faint and he knew that his judgment was becoming clouded despite his fervent attempts at defense.

At this rate, he would not be able to last.

"C-cut it out," he forced through his lips between breathless gasps, screwing up his face at the struggle of trying not to cave in entirely.

"Like I said..." Seifer rumbled in that low baritone that Squall loved so much, "I just can't help it."

He grazed the back of Squall's ear with the tip of his tongue, smiling in satisfaction when the brunette flinched and arched into his embrace. Still, Seifer wasn't going all out; he had learned by now that Squall would only tolerate him venturing so far. The younger man guarded himself well, but Seifer had walked through his metaphorical walls before and he would keep trying until he'd succeed in breaching them completely. He wasn't worried – this would be a matter of time and patience alone.

But things were never that simple... in fact, they were far more complicated than Seifer would have ever been able to imagine.

"Stop..."

He should've picked up on the warning embedded in that flat, barely audible word that hovered in the heavy air before them. Perhaps Seifer simply didn't _want_ to pick up on it; in any case, he continued to trace an invisible trail along Squall's jugular with his lips and his tongue, while chuckling very lightly.

"Why?" he asked, not really desiring an answer of any kind.

Seifer was walking a thin line and part of him was very aware of that, too. His pride and Squall's reclusiveness made for a rather explosive and dangerous combination. Seifer was driven by the need to conquer and control, causing him to forget that the dark haired boy in his arms would not be controlled by anyone. There were those that believed to have a tight leash on Squall Leonhart, but even they could not tame his wild spirit unless he chose to allow it – which he never, ever would.

"Because I _said so_," the brunette eventually hissed with blood-curling malice, suddenly driving his elbow into Seifer's side with such force that the older teen had to retreat with a groan.

"Ungh! What the-"

Seifer's fervor was quenched by the sting in his ribcage and he looked at Squall with a much less adoring expression. The brunette had turned and was now leaning with his back against the desk, rubbing one hand along his neck as if to efface the stain of Seifer's touch. The picture bothered the blond much more than he would've ever freely admitted.

"I told you to cut the crap," Squall said dryly, but there was a well-hidden note of regret to his intonation.

"You could've been a bit less _blunt_ about it," Seifer bit back, still holding his side. "Fuck."

"Maybe if you'd use the head on your shoulders for a change, instead of the one between your legs, I wouldn't _have_ to be."

"The hell are you saying?"

"I'm telling you to stop behaving like a horny dog. I'm not your toy, alright?"

Seifer grimaced wryly. "We established that already."

"Did we?" Squall snapped, the sarcasm in his voice unforgiving. "Maybe you could actually stay the fuck away from me then?"

"Oh _please_. Stop pretending you don't like it when I touch you," the blond countered nastily. "Who the hell do you think you're bullshitting with your hissy fits, anyway? You think I can't tell? I _know_ you like it!"

"_You know nothing!"_

Seifer couldn't help but recoil in shock when the glass paperweight Squall had still been holding suddenly whipped past his face to slam into the wall somewhere behind him. It must have hit something fragile, possibly a picture frame, because there was an earsplitting sound and a stunned, painful spark that flashed across the turbulent surface of Squall's angry grey eyes. For a while, the two boys stared at each other silently, each waiting for the other to strike – or simply do _something_ but just stand there. Squall's breath came in sharp thrusts from his lungs and he only barely conjured up the ability to speak.

"Get out."

The blond winced again in response. "I-"

"I said _get out_!"

Seifer continued to stare at his opposite, mouthing something that the brunette wouldn't wanna hear. In the end, Squall's bellowed, hysteric order had left little room for arguments. Even though the realization hurt, Seifer understood this. Thus, gathering his last bits of pride and confidence around himself, he willed his features into an unmoved mask and lowered his voice to a detached, stubborn whisper.

"Fine."

Despite his better knowledge, Seifer reeled around and walked away. He didn't think that giving in and running off was the "right" thing to do, but they were heading down a path where any further word spoken could very well cause irreparable damage.

It wasn't what he wanted. It never had been.

Squall watched his classmate opening the door and stepping through it, until the dull sound of Seifer's shoes on the hardwood floor in the hallway finally died away completely. Subconsciously, Squall noticed the shattered picture frame laying pitifully strewn to pieces on the carpet by the wall, but the sight wouldn't really faze him. With every inch of his body shaking, he sank into his office chair and buried his face in hands, trying but failing to force his heartbeat to steady.

"I... I-I can't... I can't do this..."

He was whimpering between quickly drawn breaths more so than he was speaking, but he couldn't even hear his own voice beneath the painful, hollow droning inside his head. Squall didn't know what he was doing anymore; it was as if part of him had just cut itself off from reality, floating somewhere between insanity and rationale like a ghost of his former self. For a very brief moment, he wanted to run down the stairs and tell Seifer that he was sorry, so very, goddamn sorry, but he was more frightened of being rejected than having to deal with his own guilt and misery. That fear of rejection, a kind he had never felt before, was pounding through his veins with enough intensity to ruin him for good, but to Squall's great fortune, there was much more strength bound in his soul than he, or any other, would ever be able to comprehend.

But still...

"I can't... I _can't_..."

Squall was hiccoughing high in his parched throat, making it cramp and ache from the strain. A commanding voice inside his head told him not to cry, _forbid_ him to cry, but its reasons made no sense to him anymore. Tears were falling from his bloodshot eyes like bitter rain and washed down his white cheeks, leaving behind trails of salt and scarlet skin. Squall wished that they would take with them the pain that was crushing him and carry it off to some place where it would never hurt him again, but even after he had been cowering by his desk for many long minutes, his insides were still wrecked by uncontrolled agony.

"Why..."

In his current state, absorbed in the darkness of his mind, Squall couldn't understand why he was hurting the way he did. It was affecting him so much that he wanted to scream, but for what? For _who_?

"S... S-S... Sei..."

The slender fingers of his hands wrenched into his hair and clawed it for some feeble kind of relief. This wasn't really about Seifer; it probably never had been. Yes, Squall wanted to be with that obnoxious guy – he wanted to allow his kindness and affection into his life – but in reality, he knew that he was just looking for a cure to the disease in his heart. Seifer's presence seemed to promise salvation, but at what price?

One that he could never, _would_ never pay.

Of course it hurt – how couldn't it? It _had_ been hurting for three long, fucking years. The only difference was that now, he could no longer fool himself into believing that it really wasn't so bad; that he could cope, somehow.

He _couldn't_ cope – he was falling apart, piece by piece. He would've liked to blame this change on Seifer, which was true in some sense, but in the end, he believed that it was his own lack of strength that was causing him to fail. He wondered how this could possibly be. After all, he had so much to be strong for – so much to protect. Why was he faltering now, wailing like a little child instead of acting like the man he had grown to be?

_..: "You have to be strong, honey. Please, don't cry! Mommy loves you so much." :.._

Sniffing, Squall brushed the back of his hand across his nose and blinked against the sting in his eyes. He tried to swallow, but couldn't. His throat felt thick and swollen, but after biting down on his quivering lips a few times, the tension finally eased and turned into something more bearable. The rhythm of his breathing had calmed a little and was only interrupted by single coughs that were the aftermath of his sobs. What had seemed impossible to accomplish only moments before was no longer scaring him and diminishing him to a crying heap.

He _could_ do this and he _would_ do this.

They _needed_ him.

With those thoughts, his vigor came seeping back to him and drove out the panic at last. He was still alone, but only because he _chose_ to be. That was what he told himself when he wiped his tear-slicked face with his short, black sleeves, ignoring the raw, cruel pain searing through his wrists when he performed the edgy movement. Squall Leonhart wasn't going to be defeated by grief; he was no longer a child hungering for love and attention - he was an _adult_ and he didn't need anyone's help or attention. Quite contrary, there were now people who depended on _him_ - people who loved him and whose happiness was his sole responsibility.

Perhaps there were things that he would never know or understand, but this much was for certain...

He would never fail those who relied on his strength.

Not Squall.

Not in this lifetime or in any other.

* * *

Alrighty – first off, if you see a bunch of errors in this chapter, it's entirely my fault. My beta didn't have time to look over it so I decided to post it as it is. It's been sitting around for a week and I seem to have some kinda mental barrier that prevents me from starting on the next chapter before I upload the current one.

I don't really have a whole lot to say about this one... I'm sorry if it's not overly exciting :) Hope you enjoyed it anyway!


	15. The Deep End

-:-  
**Chapter 15  
The Deep End**

"_You're here, kitten – and you're reason enough."_  
-:-

Time to change has come and gone  
Watched your fears become your God

It's your decision

Overwhelmed you chose to run  
Apathetic to the stunned

It's your decision

You feed the fire that burned us all  
When you lied  
To feel the pain that spurs you on  
Black inside.

_"Your Decision" - Alice in Chains_

-:-

"Eeeh? Seifer...? What are _you_ doing here?"

"Uh?"

Grunting, with a can of overly sugared soda tipped to his lips, Seifer turned around to heed the voice that had spoken out to him so stupidly. He recognized it at once, even if he had never much talked with the guy who called it his own. Zell Dincht stood in the doorway to one of the many classrooms of Deling City High, looking impressively cute though slightly disheveled in a jeans overall, white baseball cap and wrinkly powder blue t-shirt. The spiky haired boy's face was screwed to a frown, and while he was rubbing the tip of his nose with his index finger (leaving a funny streak of black grease as he did), he looked Seifer up and down with a scrutinizing eye.

"I'm here to help out with the festival preparations," Seifer declared loftily, smoothing back his golden tresses with his palm. "_You_?"

"W-well," Zell stuttered, thrown slightly off guard by the other boy's cockiness, "I'm in the Tech and Set Club!"

He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder, pointing at a group of boys and girls assembled in the back of the room. A few other students, dressed in a similar attire as Zell's, were fussing over some pieces of electronic equipment piled upon a desk (some of which seemed to be emitting dark colored smoke), and quite frankly, they weren't looking too pleased. Seifer suddenly noticed the sharp stench of burnt wire in the air, and his lips curled into a nasty smirk.

"Tech and Set, huh?" he snickered artfully. "I see. Well, good luck with that... looks like you'll need it."

Seifer gazed at the younger teen just long enough to see his boyish smile slipping and his eyes darkening in an insulted kind of way. Chuckling, the eighteen year old flapped his hand in a lazy wave and continued on his way. He certainly had no intentions of spending the rest of his Sunday afternoon in the company of Zell and his dorky tech friends, especially considering the revolting smell that surrounded them.

No – Seifer believed that he had much better reasons to visit his school on a weekend afternoon than to watch Zell set fire to a pile of electronics, and his "reason" happened to be brunette and gifted with outrageously hot _assets_.

He noticed several other kids and a couple of teachers scurrying through the hallways, shouting orders or carrying equipment from one place to the next, but only those of them wearing clothes splattered with paint actually managed to pique Seifer's interest. Most of the artists seemed to emerge from the general direction of the auditorium, which caused the blond to elect it as his first point of destination.

Seifer crushed his soda can with one fist and flicked it into the nearest trash bin. As he trudged towards the auditorium, his hands submerged in the pockets of his long khakis, he could feel a slight pang of nervousness in the left side of his chest. He wasn't sure whether his agitation was really justified or not, but he _did_ know that the last words between him and Squall had been spoken in anger. They hadn't seen each other since the day before, when the brunette had flung a paperweight at him and practically kicked him out of his room.

'_If ya ask me, the paperweight alone is reason enough to feel at least a lil on edge. Who knows, he might still be lugging it around for target practise.'_

Shrugging, Seifer threw his head into his neck and sighed. Honestly - the _dangers_ he was willing to put up with these days...

Loud construction noise and faint, off-pitch chords of music finally attracted Seifer's undivided attention. He had stopped short before a set of wide open double doors and curiously peeked past them. Obviously, this had to be the auditorium (Seifer had never actually felt the need to visit it before) - there were hundreds of dark red, cushioned seats lined up before a raised stage, which was bustling with about two dozen or so students. Some were lugging around microphones, tools, musical instruments or very odd looking props. Seifer could've sworn that he saw one guy strutting about with a long, frizzy looking silver wig, a pink bow tie and a knobbly wooden cane.

What kind of play were they going to perform, anyway? The Very Gay Adventures of Abraham Fuckin' Lincoln?

He didn't really care as much as he might've let on; there was really only one person who truly interested him right now, and after screening the hall for a good few seconds, Seifer had finally caught sight of him.

Squall (aka the ice princess, Sir Glaresalot and object of Seifer's not-so-secret desire) was sitting cross-legged on a metal scaffolding up on the stage, loosely holding a brush in one hand and a piece of stained cloth in the other. Every now and then, he would exercise smooth strokes upon the floor length canvas of the stage's backdrop, which, to Seifer's unschooled eye, resembled an indoor scenery of some kind.

'_Hn...'_

Seifer remained by the door for a little while longer, but merely admiring his classmate from a distance quickly bored the hell out of him. In the end, he really hadn't come all this way on a lazy summer's afternoon to settle for secretly ogling Squall like a stalking fan girl.

Drawing up his shoulders as he took in a breath that was a bit deeper and more prolonged than usual, Seifer quietly stalked down to the stage. He discovered his art teacher, Fujin, squatting off in a corner to explain a pile of debris to a few eager students. Nobody was paying any kind of attention to Seifer as he leapt up on the stage and crossed the highly polished wooden floor boards to the scaffolding Squall was still lounging on.

He approached his brunette classmate from behind, or, more precisely, _below_; Squall was a good eight feet's worth in the air, surrounded by open paint buckets, dirty brushes and old rags of cloth. Seifer watched him shifting around for a moment, eyes keenly raking over a lean body in washed out, paint specked blue jeans, a dark grey, long-sleeved shirt and the usual leather wristbands, as if to memorize its precise, ethereal beauty. However, considering the fact that this very body had already haunted Seifer in his dreams, there was no need to attempt at stamping it into his memory right now. He smiled faintly at the brunette's feet in half-laced black leather boots that dangled playfully towards the ground, before he noisily cleared his throat.

"Why, and here I was thinking you might be afraid of heights."

Squall froze in the midst of a complicated-looking brush stroke and it took several long seconds (in which he didn't dare move a single muscle) until he veered around very slowly. A tall, slender girl with shoulder length red hair and square, black rimmed glasses, who had been working up on the scaffolding with Squall, had turned as well and was glinting darkly at Seifer with one hand fast on her hip, as if to demand "And what do _you_ want, jock boy?"

The brunette himself didn't seem to mind the intrusion as much as he should have, or at least he looked surprised more so than annoyed. Seifer noticed that his skin was rather paler than usual and his eyes had a tired red tint to them, rimmed by dark blue shadows.

'_Doesn't look like he got much sleep, does he? Not that that comes as much of a surprise or anything.'_

With an expression that was mostly neutral for the time being, Squall glanced down at his classmate and lowered his brush that was dripping with dark green paint.

"Seifer?" he asked, as if he wasn't quite sure that this was indeed the blond's name. "What are _you_ doing here?"

Seifer regarded the boy with a smirk that was brighter than his white t-shirt. Mocking astonishment, he tapped the side of his head with one long, tanned index finger.

"You know, you're the second person to ask me that," he pondered. "I really don't know whether I should feel flattered or insulted, princess."

Quite predictably, Squall's handsome face drooped into a frown. The dark haired boy could have easily fooled anyone into believing that Squall "Ice Princess" Leonhart was physically incapable of smiling, but Seifer, luckily, knew better than that. When the brunette continued to stare at him from his elevated position, the brawny blond took an inviting step backwards and motioned his friend down with a swooping gesture.

"Come on already. I wanna talk to you for a sec."

Even though Squall seemed reluctant to interrupt his work to converse with the older youth, he wordlessly set his brush onto a dirty rag, curled his hands around the edge of the metal platform and smoothly dropped off the scaffolding. The redheaded girl, however, was apparently fighting down the urge to throw something at Seifer, because her freckled hand was quivering dangerously and her expression was sour.

Seifer found her displeasure both amusing and irritating at the same time.

'_Whaddayaknow, looks like I'm stepping on someone's toes here. Imagine that. Yeah, well, you may be a hot lil redheaded nerd and all, bitch, but the only way Squall will ever pay attention to ya is if you can figure out how to sprout bristles and take a plunge in the paint bucket. Besides, don't even think of butting into my territory. Your dumbass would regret it pretty damn quickly, I promise you that.'_

Despite his seemingly unwavering arrogance, Seifer considered it smarter to usher Squall away from the stage entirely and towards the dimly lit back of the auditorium, where they would hopefully be able to talk in private without being glared at loathingly from above. The brunette followed Seifer up several flights of stairs and into a dark row of squashy velvet seats with visible discomfort, but he didn't let out a single peep of complaint.

Frankly, Seifer found the boy's meek behavior a bit strange, but he wasn't dumb enough to ask.

Grunting contently, the blond flopped into a random seat and threw his legs up on the back of a chair before him. Squall's steel blue eyes flickered to Seifer's dirty brown boots with unconcealed disapproval, but he obviously wasn't in the mood to lecture the ill-mannered teen, because he finally sank down beside him, looking grim.

Seifer chortled when he saw that Squall had left one seat empty between them.

"What's this?" the blond jeered in a rough voice, pointing at the unoccupied chair. "Scared?"

Squall furrowed his brows, but said nothing. His gaze was pinned to the stage up front with typical ignorance; he only acknowledged Seifer's presence by piercing him with quick sideway glances.

"... Fine, have it your way."

Despite his deceivingly complacent comment, Seifer stood up from his chair and resumed an identical position in the seat that had once set him and Squall apart. The brunette didn't protest, but his body language had clearly stiffened. With his arms crossed tightly before his chest and his lips thin, he continued to stare off into the distance.

"You look like you've got a stick up your ass or something," Seifer leered while moving his knee an inch closer to Squall's. "Loosen up. I'm just here to talk."

Squall didn't seem to find that concept particularly relaxing, because his jaw hardened visibly. Seifer noticed that his eyes looked brighter than usual... almost glazed over. Perhaps it was just the fact that they were bloodshot and framed by translucent shadows, but Squall looked almost like he was about to cry.

'_... Really, I wish you wouldn't make it so fuckin' hard on yourself. **I** know I'm not here to hurt you, **you** know I'm not here to hurt you – what's the big deal? I really think we should be past this insecurity stage by now.'_

Sighing, Seifer tilted his head sideways and grimaced, which gave him the expression of a confused puppy dog.

"Squall," he said, suddenly very calm and serious. "Seriously, are you planning on looking at me _at all,_ or are you just going to keep pretending I don't exist?"

It was a valid question, and to Seifer's honest surprise, Squall responded to it by finally reeling his head around to him. His long, narrow jugular jerked quite noticeably when he did so – as if he had to gulp down his pride, ignorance or fear in order to oppose whatever was to come.

"... Why are you here?"

Lifting an eyebrow, Seifer tried to give the impression of being politely puzzled by the harsh edge that had accompanied Squall's otherwise toneless question.

"Why _wouldn't_ I be?" the blond retorted shrewdly.

"Because you have no reason to be here," Squall shot back, a quick note of irritation now lacing his tone. "_None_, alright? The only people that are here today are either in Tech and Set, Drama Club or members of the Art Club. _You_ aren't a member of any of those!"

"True," Seifer agreed complacently as he shrugged and crossed his arms behind his head to lean back in his seat and gaze at the dark ceiling. "But _you're_ here, kitten – and you're reason enough."

He watched Squall's reaction from the corner of his emerald eyes, the line of his mouth relaxed and showing off something that vaguely resembled a smile. To his disapproval, he saw a blankness falling over Squall's face, which – so the blond mused as he was waiting for a reply of some sort – was without even the slightest traces of softness or childhood. The brunette's cheekbones were carved high and elegant, but the sallow whiteness of his skin gave him a sort of hollow, bloodless look; whether this was to blame on Squall's cutting habit, lack of sleep or something else, Seifer couldn't possibly say.

In any case, Squall didn't seem too pleased about the justification of his presence.

Indeed, the brunette's already gloomy aura had transformed into one of pure hostility. Anyone else would've probably been flattered by Seifer's flirty confession, but to Squall, it was just another stab at his sanity. The last thing he needed to hear was that the blond had come all this way to Deling City High on a Sunday just to see him, especially after what had happened between them the day before. Whether or not Seifer's bold words were genuine really made no difference, or at least they didn't catapult Squall onto Cloud Nine – not that he believed such a place existed, anyway. He had stopped believing in heaven, love, goodness and innocence the same way he had ceased believing in fairytales. In his eyes, God and Cupid were no more or less real than Santa Claus.

At the same time, he realized that it probably didn't matter so much what _he_ thought – for whatever reason, Seifer had appointed him the target of his amorous advances and unfortunately, the blond teen was more stubborn than a fucking mountain goat.

What the hell would it take for Seifer to finally give up?

'_I can't believe he really showed up here. It doesn't even make any sense! I yelled at him, I threw stuff at him, I kicked him out of my house and never apologized for any of it, but he is **still **sticking around! Is he just exceptionally thick, or...?'_

Even inside his head, Squall didn't like the sound of this. He had to admit that Seifer honestly confused him. The blond was unpredictable as hell (this, for a change, was a place he _did_ believe in); Seifer hadn't strayed from his course of conquest even once, and that made him _very_ different from everyone whom Squall had ever dealt with. Perhaps the only person who was as remotely persistent as the blond football player was Selphie Tilmitt, the bubbly girl he worked with at "Ward's." She was the only one, aside from Seifer, whom Squall had not managed to run off. Every time he went to work, she'd ask him how he was doing... how his day had been... and she'd tell him that, if he ever needed anything, he should never hesitate to give her a call.

'_... This isn't the same, though. First of all, I'm hardly ever forced to talk to her. She'll usually just ramble and leave me alone when she realizes I'm not listening. Second, Selphie's a **girl**. She's not like Seifer. She's not like...'_

Next to him, Seifer breathed a snort of indignation and caused Squall's train of thought to derail as he so often did. For some reason, Seifer really seemed to get a kick out of unsettling Squall.

"Hey," Seifer piped up jokingly, "Quit bein' all crabby already and talk to me. I'm gettin' bored over here, ya know."

"... I don't fucking care."

Squall prowled the sea of empty chairs before them with his eyes, carefully avoiding to meet gazes with Seifer. The brunette was still almost like a child that way – believing that if he could just ignore whatever was scaring him, pretending it didn't exist, then eventually, it would simply go away. Of course he should've known better, but there were so many things he should have done that it was easier to just stay blind and naive at this point.

"You're being a real fuckin' grumpy ass, you know," Seifer declared with a lazy drawl as he flexed his foot on top of the chair before him. "Here I am, all nice, _even though_ you tried to perforate my nugget with a fuckin' _paperweight_, but all I get from you is attitude."

"You make it sound like I _asked_ you to come," the brunette retaliated in a cold voice. "I _didn't_."

Anybody who might've been watching their conversation from a distance probably would've found the scene to be rather peculiar; the two boys were sitting right next to each other, which could have fooled anyone into believing that they were the best of friends, but they talked to the thickening air before them rather than to each other's face. Both of them were looking tense and emotional in their own, personal way; Squall seemed annoyed and profoundly exhausted, whereas Seifer was simpering in an arrogant sort of fashion that was easily belied by the troubled frown that was dragging on his handsome features.

For now, Seifer's patience was still dominating over his exasperation, but he wouldn't be able to restrain his temper for much longer.

Squall knew that perfectly well.

The disconcerted brunette was kneading his lean upper arms with his hands, which he had crossed before his quickly heaving chest. He had slid low into his chair as if to disappear from sight, and the soles of his boots were scraping across the linoleum floor restlessly. He didn't know what exactly was keeping him from leaping out of his seat and turning his back on Seifer for good, but he sincerely hoped that his reasons weren't what he feared them to be.

But perhaps he knew better than that, too.

'_I have to do this... there's no other way. The longer it takes... the more it's going to hurt. I **need** to get this over with.'_

"As a matter of fact," Squall suddenly continued neutrally, as if they had simply been discussing the weather, "I want nothing to do with you."

He sincerely hoped that this words had been clear as crystal and harsh enough to hurt, but Seifer was showing no signs of Squall's rudeness affecting him. Instead, the tall blond boy was chuckling softly, although his laugh sounded a bit more blanched than usual.

"Really..." Seifer replied, elongating the intonation of the word more than was necessary. "You know what I think? I think you're full of shit. _I_ think you _like_ me."

Seifer was lolling nonchalantly in his chair when Squall let out an angry hiss. Finally, the brunette whipped around to confront him and Seifer wasn't quite sure what to make of his younger classmate's expression. There was anger, obviously, but there was also a nervous quiver surging through the brunette's body that Seifer could only interpret as panic. If it hadn't been for the lack of ammunition, Seifer thought it likely that Squall would've thrown something at him again. And indeed, his assumption wasn't far off; throughout the past years, Squall had developed an unsettling habit of insulting and physically threatening anyone who was stupid enough to corner him, and right now, Seifer was doing exactly that.

"_Me_? _Like_ you?" Squall spat shrilly, his eyes so oddly dilated that his black pupils looked huge. "What the fuck are you, _deranged_? Let me get this across to you once and for all, you stupid fuck: I am _not_ interested in you! I'm not, okay? I don't wanna be friends with you, I don't wanna go out with you, hell, I don't even wanna be in the same fucking _building_ as you! You're annoying the piss outta me! I want you to stay the fuck out of my life!"

Squall's last sentence had been pointed and overly high-pitched. His blatant cruelty was enough to make any man turn tail and run, but Seifer was either blessed with exceptionally thick skin or he simply didn't care what Squall said to him. Shrugging, the good-looking blond breathed a bored sigh and smoothed back his hair with one hand.

"... And you actually expect me to believe that?" he exhaled with an amused grin.

"Fuck no, I don't!" Squall snapped back instantly, trying to force a tint of sarcasm into his brittle voice if only to cover up his anxiety. "I don't _care_ enough to _expect_ so much as a flying fuck from you!"

The dark haired boy could feel his own stomach revolting when those words rolled off his tongue, but he bit back his emotions as he always did. Squall's reclusiveness and spitefulness might have looked like they came perfectly natural, but they _didn't_; the brunette didn't _enjoy_ being mean to Seifer, but he also wasn't one to back down from a task that he considered necessary.

Still, that flicker of bitterness that flashed across the velvety emerald surface of Seifer's eyes sent a jab of pain to Squall's heart that was enough to make him wince.

"I see," Seifer murmured after a long moment of silence in which they simply stared at each other, their bodies rotated uncomfortably in their chairs. "And why is that?"

It was untypical for Seifer to ask a question like that; usually, he would _assume_ and not inquire, for simplicity's (and a gigantic ego's) sake. Squall's behavior had confused him to such a degree, however, that he thought it rather unsafe to keep up said habit any longer. He wasn't sure why he couldn't just _believe_ what the brunette had told him – why he couldn't accept Squall's rejection and move on.

'_Why? ... Because I don't want to.'_

The reason was so very plain and yet so stunningly complicated. He didn't _want_ to do what Squall was asking from him; he didn't want to stay out of the brunette's life. He had never quite felt this way before, but it was a feeling he deemed important enough to hold on to, at least for a little while. After that... well... he'd just have to see. It was difficult to make predictions on something he had never, not even once, experienced in his entire life.

'_Oh god, don't tell me this is what all the dumb little girls call "love"...? Nah. No way. It's just a crush, that's all. A bit of an obsession, who the fuck cares. I want this and I know he does, too. I do wonder why he's so hell bent on pushing me away, though. It's not like I mean any harm to him. Without tooting my horn, I'd say I've been pretty damn nice to him so far!'_

He finally noticed that Squall's expression was a bit vacant. At first, the eighteen year old blamed this on having asked the brunette why he wanted him to get lost, but when he realized that Squall seemed transfixed on a point _behind_ Seifer, he finally turned around.

At first, he didn't recognize the tall, ebony haired boy in a white polo shirt and pressed khakis, who was weaving his way through the row of seats towards them. He was fashionably pale and sporting an air-headed, pompous expression.

Somehow, he _did_ look familiar, but Seifer couldn't place a finger on that feeling.

It wasn't necessary, anyhow, because the youth stopped inches from Seifer's chair and excitedly returned Squall's scowl and his blond classmate's confused gaze with a pretentious smile.

"Seifer," he exclaimed loudly while slapping Seifer's shoulder, who acknowledged the amicable gesture with a surprised grunt, "Good to see you here! Really admirable of you to help out with the preparations even though you _just_ joined the school. Always nice to see some class spirit, you know?"

"Eh..."

"I'm Nida, Class President," the boy added, puffing out his chest. "We had gym class together, remember? Tuesday, second period!"

"Oh... yeah... right."

Seifer only vaguely remembered; this week had been far too busy to recall just any old douchenozzle's name and face. Nida leaned smugly against the back of a seat in front of them while now seizing Squall with his dark brown eyes.

"Squall, you're here too! Art Club, I presume?" he asked crisply. "Swell. How's that ankle doing, anyways?"

Seifer turned to shift his attention to Squall, and he almost collapsed with laughter when he caught a glimpse of the brunette's unpleasant expression. Clearly, Squall didn't seem to think that any of his body parts, whether healthy or not, were any of his Class President's concern. His upper lip curled slightly as he squinted his eyes to slits of cold silver and folded his arms once more.

"What do you want, Nida?" he growled, not making any effort to conceal the note of annoyance in his inflection.

The blond could tell that President Nida was highly offended by Squall's pissed off response to his well-meant question. Fluffing himself up like a ruffled rooster, the black haired boy flared his nostrils in an attempt of looking both furious and imperative.

"Why, honestly, I don't understand why you always have to be so _rude_, Leonhart," Nida huffed stridently, looking like he was badly constipated. "I simply saw that you two were having a little get-together up here and thought I'd say hi."

"We're _not_ having a 'get-together', you moron," Squall said in a tone of loathing that Seifer had always presumed was especially reserved for him. "And even if we were, it'd be none of _your _concern. Quit sticking your nose where it doesn't belong and mind your own fucking business, Nida."

'_Whoa-hoo. That was harsh, even for his standards,'_ Seifer thought, amused but nonetheless startled by Squall's absurd coldness. _'Poor lil Nida doesn't look like he's used to being told off like that.'_

Indeed, Nida's pale face had turned an impressive shade of vermillion under Squall's icy stare, before the formerly so pompous Class President swelled indignantly and finally whirled around on the heel to quickly stalk away, mumbling something that Seifer could only identify as "Honestly!".

"Well, holy shit, Mr. Hyde," Seifer started with a respectful whistle as he looked Squall up and down. "Poor Nida is gonna need ego surgery after this memorable lil experience."

"Like I give a fuck."

Despite Squall's very heartless words, Seifer couldn't help but think how ridiculously beautiful the brunette was, cowering there in his chair all pissed off at the world. He was flipping dark brown blades of hair out of his delicately chiseled face, while grimly monitoring how Nida disappeared from the auditorium.

Without thinking on it much, Seifer let his pale ruby lips split into a grin and he whispered into Squall's ear "I could kiss you right here, ya know."

The brunette ricocheted backwards and pierced him with a look of sheer revolt, his eyes glittering like finely cut sapphires.

"And I could castrate you right here, _ya know_," he spat, imitating Seifer's shifty drawl with disturbing accuracy.

Seifer jumped dramatically in his seat and cupped his crotch protectively.

"Man, you're a scary lil thing, I swear," he scoffed, not at all disgruntled. "Always threatening the family jewels like a crazy ex-girlfriend or something."

Squall wasn't fooled by his shitty performance, either.

"You and your balls can go cry me a fucking river, see what I care," he replied with a snide scowl, while flipping Seifer the bird.

"And on top of that, you manage to be a downright PMS'ing _bitch_!" Seifer added loudly. "Seriously. You sure you're a dude?"

Of course, Seifer had already once assured himself of Squall's manhood – literally so, not counting the many times he had replayed their little make-out session in his mind. The brunette, too, recalled their romantic little episode in Seifer's kitchen quite vividly, but he didn't seem too happy about having to relive that memory.

With an enraged growl, he threw his head to the side and resumed glaring at the stage.

"Christ, will you fucking leave already?" Squall ordered tartly.

Seifer, however, merely reclined in his chair and said with an adorable smile, "Sometimes I really don't know whether to pity you, molest you or punch your fuckin' lights out. You have a way of making me wanna do all three at once."

"I'm touched. Now fuck off."

"Aww," Seifer cooed. "But this is so much fun."

"I don't consider you giving me a headache 'fun'," the brunette shot back testily. "If I really enjoyed the feeling of my brain being split in half I could just run it into a concrete wall without having to put up with your stupid blabber."

"Well," Seifer breathed with a bright chuckle while wriggling his knees and poking his own thigh muscles like a hyperactive toddler, "Aren't you just a masochistic little thing? I guess you could do that, if you were really hell bent on messing up your pretty face and whatnot. Personally, I like your face the way it is, so I think I'd rather keep irritating you a lil more."

Squall realized that this was going absolutely nowhere; Seifer was literally as thick as a brick. Squall had thought that he had made himself perfectly clear, but apparently, that wasn't the case. Seifer was as cheerful and unassuming as ever, relishing their senseless banter more than he seemed to be bothered by it. How anyone could _not_ be put off by his deliberate rudeness was seriously beyond Squall's understanding. With a painful lurch in his stomach, he decided that he'd have to resort to more drastic measures in order to get his point across.

In a changed voice that was deliberately bleached of any trace of kindness, and instead as wounding as a razor's blade, he finally ground out, "Look, Almasy – I'm not a fag like you are, alright? Are you not getting that, or what's the problem here? Maybe it hasn't occurred to you, but not every guy's into making out with other dudes. So let me make this perfectly clear for you – the only thing I want from you is for you to stay the fuck away from me, because quite honestly, you just gross me the fuck out."

Squall had finally struck a nerve, and he had struck it hard. He wasn't proud of it, which was part of the reason why he avoided Seifer's face and the taken aback, baffled look that had conquered the blond's handsome features.

"What?" Seifer asked with a strangled, dangerously swaying gasp that almost didn't make it past his lips. "Excuse me, what did you just say?"

He wasn't sure whether to believe what he had just heard, but there was a very persuasive, nagging voice inside his head that informed him triumphantly "told you so." If Squall's words hadn't reminded him so much of the public ridicule he had been subjected to at his old high school, perhaps he would have been able to see right through the brunette's paper-thin façade. Squall Leonhart surely wasn't the type to verbally degrade people for their sexuality, but Seifer's bruised ego chose to overlook that characteristic of the sensitive dark haired boy for the time being.

This sudden raw blow of pain that was dealt right to his heart was so sickly familiar, how _couldn't_ he believe what he was hearing?

And yet, he wished so much that he was wrong.

"I asked you a fucking question," the blond growled, the sudden bite in his inflection stunningly sharp.

"You heard me," Squall retorted frostily, but his voice sounded somewhat disjointed.

He still wasn't looking at Seifer, and instead continued to stare glassy-eyed at the stage. At this point, he just wanted to get this over with.

"But if you'd like to hear it again, be my guest - I said you were an annoying faggot, and I want you to stay the fuck away from me," Squall forced himself to repeat, ignoring the white-hot glare of pain that had erupted in his chest.

"You little shit..." Seifer hissed softly. "You little piece of fucking shit."

Inwardly, Squall winced at each of Seifer's unkind words that struck like whiplashes. He knew he deserved every single condescending syllable of them, but nevertheless, they stung like nothing else in his life ever had. Almost desperately now, he kept staring straight ahead, clinging on to his own persistence that was nothing short of stupid.

'_Don't look down. Don't look at him. Don't look down. It's fine. It's fine. Don't start crying. It's fine. Keep your cool. You have to do this. Stay calm. Don't look at him. Don't. Don't. Just don't.'_

"Fuck this shit, I've had enough."

He could hear Seifer rising from his seat in one jerky motion. For a second, he expected to be hit and his muscles tensed to prepare him for the blow, but the blond never laid a hand on him. Instead, Seifer turned with a last indignant snort and walked away from Squall with a pace hurried enough to border to a run.

'_H-he's leaving. He's finally... he's... ugh. He's gone. He's gone, alright? He's gone. Shit. Shit. Pull yourself together. Why the fuck am I sad about this? What's wrong with me? Why...'  
_

Although Squall was trying to shut down his own feelings, he knew the answer to that question – he had probably never _not_ known it. But Squall had grown up learning to ignore the truth and making lies believable in the eyes of anyone, even himself. In the end, he would doubtlessly collapse under this burden of trading reality for something that hurt far more than any truth ever would... but not today.

Not today.

Even so, he couldn't prevent his aching grey eyes from fogging up. All he _could_ do was shield himself from anyone's view and block out the reality of his own feelings towards Seifer, which had nothing to do with digust or hatred. Behind long, ivory fingers, crystal tears fell silently along an elegantly carved jaw line at last, mingling with an agony that was so quiet, it was louder than a scream.

Meanwhile, Seifer had taken the stairs in stride and reached the exit, but as if something was calling him, holding him back, he threw a last resentful glance across his shoulder, only to be startled by what his gaze took in. He saw Squall doubling over and covering his scarily white face with one hand (the trembling of which Seifer couldn't acknowledge from the distance), visibly breaking down in the middle of Deling City High's auditorium. The blond paused for a very short moment, honestly moved by the sight, but Squall's deliberately hurtful words still stood etched in flames before his inner eye.

_..: "I said you were an annoying faggot." :.._

'_Faggot... fag... right... how could I ever forget...?'_

Biting down on the corner of his bottom lip, he pretended not to care – pretended not to _see _that whatever Squall had said was killing him. Perhaps this was too big for him to handle... or too small to matter. Either way, it was no longer any of his business. Maybe it never had been.

Well... whatever.

With features hard as stone, he raced out of the auditorium, Deling City High and, as he presumed without a sliver of a doubt, Squall Leonhart's life.

* * *

Oh, the craziness! I updated and it _didn't_ take me two months! I know, I know, it's fairly short - sorry about that.

This one might be a bit rushed. I'll probably regret by tomorrow that I posted it already. Blah. Anyway, the next chapter will be better XD

Again, this hasn't been checked by my beta. I figured she'd be busy because it's the middle of the week and I wanted it to be a bit of a surprise :) Thanks for all the hard work, Virulent Enmity! She's great and deserves all the Squall and Seifer smexing cookies in the world. With sugar on top, no less.


	16. Nemesis

-:-  
**Chapter 16  
Nemesis  
**  
"_If I hadn't said anything, I would've hated myself for the rest of my life."_

-:-

I know I can't be with you

I do what I have to do

I know I can't be with you

I do what I have to do

And I have the sense to recognize

That I don't know how to let you go

I don't know how to let you go.

_"Do What You Have To Do" - Sarah McLachlan_

-:-

When his emerald green eyes casually grazed the random clusters of people that had rallied at Deling City High School on a cheerful Monday morning, Seifer found himself wondering why he had even bothered to get out of bed. This was no ordinary school day - there'd be no one taking attendance and no teacher calling his parents in Balamb if any facet of Seifer's behavior was not to their specific liking. Instead, classes had been canceled and replaced by theatric plays, school choir performances, silly kiddy games and presentations of every educational, social and athletic event that had occurred at D.C. High throughout the previous school year. Hundreds of parents, siblings and distant relatives were bustling in the hallways of the school building, apparently having the time of their lives.

With an apathetic snort, Seifer inhaled the last greasy scraps of hot dog he had been lugging around in one hand.

'_This is lame as fuck.'_

Why in the hell all these people would willingly waste their afternoon at a childish, meaningless festival was far beyond Seifer's comprehension. Hell, _he_ was a student here and he was bored out of his poor, suffering brain. The only thing that had kept him entertained over the last hour or so was the tricky task of steering clear from people that he knew but wished he didn't; earlier on, he had just barely managed to avoid an embarrassing collision with Rinoa and the entire goddamn Heartilly clan. He had been forced to flee into the crowded cafeteria, where he had busied himself with the purchase of two hot dogs and a soda. Some parents from the school board were selling cake and pies, too, but Seifer wasn't really feeling his sweet tooth today.

As a matter of fact, he wasn't feeling a whole lot of anything.

Sighing grimly, he leaned backwards against the hard surface of a painted brick wall that was part of one of the more empty hallways - the art wing, to be precise. Though he had already gobbled up his food, Seifer was still carrying his Pepsi can. The dark, sugary drink tasted a bit stale by now, but he didn't care much as he tilted his head back and drained the last of it in one gulp.

'_... What am I still doing here, anyway? Or again, come to think of it.'_

This was a question he had asked himself more than just once. Roughly twenty-four hours had streaked by since Seifer's last visit to D.C. High, yet it certainly didn't feel that way; the hotly bubbling fury and constant ache over his classmate's words were almost as fresh as they had been when Squall had vented his nasty temper on him in the auditorium.

But only almost.

Seifer had been brooding heavily since that unpleasant scenario with the grouchy brunette, trying to figure out what exactly had happened, but unfortunately, he hadn't come to any kind of brilliant conclusion. He hadn't been struck by a flash of much needed enlightenment when he had laid awake in his bed that night, nor when he had ultimately snapped under the frustration and hurled one of his coffee cups against the wall in the morning. The only thing he knew for sure was that he was now one mug short and royally pissed off. Then again, of course, it was also much more complicated than that. "Pissed" just didn't really do the feeling pulsating like acid in his veins enough justice. Seifer was hurt, upset, confused, irritated, desperate and a million other things of which the exact terms wouldn't come to him right now.

'_Yeah, this is just **excellent**. Fuck this shit, man, I've had it.'_

His throat was sore from spending a sleepless night on the covers of his bed in his drafty room, but that didn't keep him from grunting roughly in defiance. Really, he had no reason to linger at this sorry excuse for a festival any longer, and he was about to pass out from the "excitement", anyway. Yawning, habit drove him to reduce his soda can to a shriveled piece of scrap metal, when suddenly...

"... So, that's the one, huh?"

"... Yeah."

"Ooh wow, I _love_ it, sweetie! It's gorgeous! And it's huge... that must've taken you _forever_ to finish! I'm so glad I finally get to see it!"

"It—"

"Well well, and here I was thinking your pictures couldn't possibly get any gloomier. Tell me, are you going through some kind of teen crisis or what, Squall? Anything you'd like to talk about, hm?"

Seifer froze mid-movement, his fingers clamped around the already dented aluminum siding of the soda can. The voices that had traveled to his ears came from just around the corner, and with distinct surprise, he realized that he recognized at least one of them.

'_No fucking way...'_

Listening more closely now, he soundlessly slipped along the wall, his curiosity meter peaking.

"Oh, stop teasing him, Kato. You know how much his art means to him!"

"Right... I guess I'm simply not much of an art appreciator - no offense, kiddo, right? I just don't see much in this except for a big glob of black paint."

"... It's not black."

"Not, huh? Well, it sure _looks_ black to me, Squall."

"You're wrong, then. I didn't use any black."

Without taking much precaution or considering that eavesdropping was in fact quite rude, Seifer peered along the edge of the wall and down the main hallway. The formerly unhurried pace of his heartbeat had picked up in strides, but he was too busy to care; if his ears weren't deceiving him, he had just heard the name "Squall" twice, as well as the brunette boy's monotone voice arguing with another male and a familiar sounding female.

'_Can't be them.'_

Oh, but it _could_.

Only a few feet away from the blond's current position, a very small group of people had huddled around that one, particularly dark painting of Squall's that Seifer had admired on his second day at school. Seifer recognized Raine even from the back by her long, sweeping brown hair, short height and frail statue. Then, with a startled jolt surging through his body, he made out Squall, whose face was thrown into relief when the brunette looked away from his painting and down to the floor. The blond found that his younger classmate looked extraordinarily tense, but before he could ponder the notion any further, a man standing closely behind Raine snared his undivided attention.

'_Hey... then this must be...'_

Seifer was still wrapped around the corner of the art wing, not minding how strange he must have looked to anyone walking by, as he studied the tall, ebony haired man who stood with the two Leonharts. He had to be Seifer's height, probably taller, and he was definitely over-dressed for the nonchalance of the occasion in his crisp black business suit, polished leather shoes and perfectly combed-back hair. Seifer couldn't see the man's face too well, but he had no problems picking up each of his words that echoed through the hallway in an equally nasty and refined way.

"No black you say, hm?" the guy in the suit asked silkily, his voice dominating the air, and Seifer lifted one eyebrow at his snide tone. "I guess I better get my eyes checked, then."

"Honey, don't—"

"I only used blue and red," Squall interrupted his mother, frowning as he scrutinized his own painting. "That's it. Nothing else."

"Are you kidding me? I don't see any blue _or_ red," the man, who could be none other but the infamous Kato Kearan, retorted smugly.

"I think I can see some red right here," Raine tried soothingly, brushing her right index-finger along the canvas on the wall. "Yes, definitely... and there's some right here, too. Red lines, I think...?"

Despite the distance that parted them, Seifer noticed how Kato's sharply cut face curled vindictively. Squall's mother couldn't have seen her husband's grimace, because she had leaned forward to study her son's artwork in more detail.

"If you say so, darling," the man replied placidly, not sounding sweet at all, before he turned to Squall. "I'm not trying to rain on your parade, kid, but it still looks black to me."

Kato seemed to enjoy toying with his stepson's feelings, but apparently, Squall had long grown weary of the man's attitude and their conversation.

"... Whatever," he replied flatly, training his eyes on a faraway wall.

"What is it supposed to be, anyway?" Kato kept prying with a mean chuckle. "Aside from a 'seeming' overabundance of black paint, that is."

Seifer didn't know how or why, but his previous anger and bitterness had been completely wiped from his mind. Seeing Squall standing there, mocked and put on the spot by someone who should have been supportive like his mother (who was now frowning and scolding her husband for his cutting sarcasm), quickly brought the blond's blood to a boil. Without thinking twice about what he was doing, he stepped out from his awkward position and approached the now silent group from behind.

"It _says_ what it is right there on the goddamn tag," he snapped in a dark, almost aggressive tone of voice, causing both Squall and Raine to start and wheel around in surprise. "It's a lion, alright? And if he says that he only used blue and red paint, then you better take his damn word for it."

Still clutching his soda can in one hand, Seifer folded his arms before his chest in wordless bravado and coolly surveyed his opposites' reactions. Raine was beaming at him, seeming equally amazed and pleased to see him again so soon, whereas Squall regarded him with a very vacant, dumbstruck expression from behind her. Kato, however, was an entirely different story; his lightly tanned face had taken on a sour look, and his eyes, which were of the same pale grey that streaked his neatly cropped hair, were as cold and unkind as welded steel. Apparently, he wasn't quite accustomed to teenage strangers getting lippy with him.

"And just who might _you_ be, exactly?" Kato asked dryly as he looked down upon Seifer with an expression of arrogance.

"Honey, this is Seifer! Seifer Almasy!" Raine exclaimed before Seifer had a chance to introduce himself and motioned towards the blond. "I've told you about him, remember? He's Squall's new classmate!"

"Oh, really," the man replied neutrally, but something ominous had begun to flicker behind his rather transparent grey eyes. "Is that right...?"

"Yes! Seifer, this is my husband, Kato. You two haven't met yet, have you?"

Slowly shaking his head, the dark haired man named Kato extended his right hand curtly. For a second, Seifer hesitated on whether to take it, but when he saw Raine's rapt and cheerful face, he couldn't bring himself to disappoint her. With a stale grin and muttering a vague "nice to meet you", he shook hands with the man who definitely looked the part of a successful lawyer, judging by his dazzling gold Rolex and expensive tailored suit. He was good-looking and it was difficult to determine his age, but Seifer guessed him to be in his mid or late forties - considerably older than Raine, he decided with a frown.

'_I don't care if he's wearing fuckin' Armani or not, the dude reminds me of a nasty ass fuckin' cockroach.'_

He could feel Kato's frosty eyes on himself, looking him up and down, sneeringly roving over the football jersey, distressed jeans and sneakers he was wearing. Raine, on the contrary, was the epitome of a glorious summer's day - bright, warm and ever so accommodating. Obviously, she was elated over having bumped into her son's new friend, whom she had taken such a liking to.

"Seifer, did your parents come, too?" she asked, looking around.

"Nah, they couldn't make it," the blond replied indifferently. "Didn't have time."

This, however, wasn't quite true; Seifer's parents had called him on Sunday night for their weekly chat, but he had conveniently "forgotten" to tell them about the festival. In the end, he really hadn't wanted to run the risk of them making the three hour trip from Balamb only for an excuse to annoy him in person.

"Aww, well, that's too bad," Raine said, sounding honestly sorry. "Ell wanted to come too, mostly in hopes to see you and hang out with Squall, of course, but she had to go to kindergarten instead because they're having a field trip to a local museum. I tell you, she was so disappointed!"

"Oh really?" Seifer asked with a jovial laugh.

"Yes, she's been talking about you all weekend! You certainly left a lasting impression on her, let me tell you. Honestly, you'll have to come over again soon so we can all have dinner together! Maybe next weekend we could have a barbecue, or go out and—"

Seifer heard her going on and nodded disjointedly in response, but his gaze had finally slipped past Raine to focus on Squall, who had been lingering discreetly in the background.

The brunette looked delectable as always in a form-hugging, light grey t-shirt with an intricate black screen print on the front, loose fitting jeans and his usual biker boots. His leather wristbands were as ever-present as the scars he was denying beneath them, but his face and the look in his eyes were entirely different from what Seifer was used to seeing; Squall was glancing at Seifer from behind unruly dark brown bangs, his expression unsure and almost powerless. His hands were buried in the pockets of his jeans and he was shifting his weight nervously from foot to foot, all the while gawking at Seifer as if he had just seen him for the very first time in his life.

"Hey, Squall," Seifer mumbled with a small smile that gave away just how awkward he felt on the inside.

After all, "hey, Squall" was far from the kind of greeting he had originally prepared for the brunette. In fact, only fifteen minutes ago, he had dreamily pictured himself snuffing Squall's lights out with a marvelous right hook, but that was before he had seen the boy being verbally pummeled by his stepfather. Apparently, Seifer's protective instincts had triumphed over his vengeful side yet again.

"... Hey," the brunette finally replied impassively, looking as uncomfortable as Seifer did while he darted evasive looks around the hallway.

That was all they said to each other, which seemed to give Raine reason enough to giggle in good-natured amusement; Squall had been strangely touchy and depressed since spending his Sunday afternoon helping out at the school festival preparations, and although he hadn't confided in her the cause for his distress, she suddenly had a very good idea of what might have possibly gone wrong. The strangely abrupt way that Seifer had departed on Saturday and how the two boys were looking at each other now made as much sense to her as a simple math equation.

With sparkling cobalt hued eyes and a knowing wink directed at Seifer, she grasped her husband's arm.

"Kato, dear, let's go get some cake."

The man tore his gaze from his stepson's blond friend and nailed it to her instead, seeming positively baffled.

"_Cake_?" he asked stupidly, as if she had suggested to go and get high on some LSD.

"That's right! I saw those fliers saying that the school board was selling some in the cafeteria and I could _really_ go for a piece of cake right now," she trilled merrily. "Squall, Seifer, we'll catch up with you in a little bit, okay? We can watch the play together! You have your cell phone on you, right, Squall?"

"Uh... yeah, but-"

"Great! See you two later then! Have fun!"

Perplexed, Seifer and Squall watched how the short, slender female practically dragged her 6'3" tall husband along and down the next best hallway, waving cheerfully until they were out of sight. This, of course, left the boys alone with each other, exchanging ill at ease glances and shuffling around nervously.

Why in the hell did everything around them suddenly seem so goddamn quiet?

"Eh..." Seifer finally broke the stiff silence, if not very articulately. "Right..."

Squall had begun to chew dully on the corner of his bottom lip - a sure sign that he was anxious, as his blond classmate had figured out by now. The brunette's eyes were bloodshot and shadowed again, perhaps even more so than the day before. For a brief moment, Seifer found himself wondering whether Squall got any quality sleep at all these days; he certainly didn't look like it.

In any case, neither of them knew exactly what to do or say. Within the short lapse of one week, so many angry, hurtful, intimate, sweet and chancy things had already been spoken between them, but now, they were both completely lost for words, no matter of which kind. Squall was nervously fidgeting with his wristbands, and surprisingly, the sight of the pale brunette twisting and clawing his much needed accessories ultimately destroyed Seifer's apprehensiveness and brought back some of his former upbeat, confident self.

"Hey, I have an idea," the blond piped up in an unnaturally bright voice, trying hard not to choke on the words, "You, uh, wanna get something to drink and... erh... hang out in the school yard for a bit, huh?"

Seifer brandished his empty soda can in front of Squall's taken aback face, as if to emphasize that he was thirsty. In reality, he was just downplaying the fact that he had no damn idea what he was doing. Squall, however, simply stared back at him as if he was the oddest sight on the planet, all the while remaining perfectly still. The brunette didn't even really seem to be contemplating the most spectacular method of flipping the blond off, like he normally would, but he rather looked like he was trying to make sense of Seifer asking him to "hang out" as if they were the best of friends.

After all, Seifer couldn't possibly have forgotten the nasty fight they had had only one day ago, could he?

Of course, the brunette couldn't conceal his practically palpable confusion and insecurity from his opposite. In some ways, Seifer thought to himself, Squall was kind of like a map - easy enough to read when you had a decent concept of what you were looking for. Then again, he was no less a complete mystery that, maybe, Seifer was never going to fully figure out. It seemed like a near miracle that the blond was still _trying_ after everything unfortunate that had happened - but perhaps love was just that:

A miracle.

'_Love... puh-lease, I don't **love** the guy! ... Do I? Hell, how would I know. Tche. I'm starting to feel like the masochist here, and I'm not the one who likes to play with razorblades, thank you very much. Maybe I should just cut my losses and forget I ever fuckin' met him. He's bound to snap again, I just know it, and I don't wanna be around when it happens. I mean, this is like playing fetch with a live hand grenade or somethin'...'_

"... A-alright."

For a moment, Seifer was thrown off balance by the brunette's softly stammered whisper that almost drowned in the droning noise of chattering students and parents that were now passing through the art wing. Then, when it finally dawned him that Squall's one-worded answer implied that he had actually accepted his clumsy invitation, Seifer's initial disorientation turned into a warm, fuzzy feeling of surprise.

Maybe there was a small chance that this cause wasn't lost just yet.

"Oh... Wait, what, really? Uh, okay, alright, great then," he stuttered, stunned and quite unlike himself, before rubbing the back of his head in a cutely boyish, distressed fashion. "Uhm, so, what do ya want? Soda? I got this one from the cafeteria, but... well... your parents..."

"There's... a vending machine around here somewhere..." Squall replied hesitantly, while performing a sweeping gesture down the hallway. "I think, anyway..."

Then, to Seifer's great amazement, the brunette was overtaken by a slight, very adorable blush as he dropped his gaze to the floor and exhaled with a gasp. Squall looked as if the fact that he had succeeded in forming a full sentence in front of Seifer had caused a huge weight to roll off his chest. Apparently, they were each feeling as nervous and emotionally exhausted as the other, and in some sense, that very important detail made the situation much easier to deal with.

"Bitchin'. Let's hit that thing up, then."

Trying hard to look bold and self-assured, Seifer coolly strode off into the direction of the vending machine that Squall had mentioned, flicking his empty Pepsi can into a trash bin on the way. The blond's heart was beating very obviously now, and no matter how many deep and supposedly calming breaths he took, the feeling of it wanting to thrust through his ribcage just didn't go away. He heard Squall dragging his feet on the linoleum, walking about a step behind him, as if he was still waging his options of fight or flight.

Truthfully, Seifer was astounded by the fact that the brunette was being as civil and docile as he was, instead of using the opportunity to throw a fit or chuck stuff at him again; this was a good thing, of course, but confusing at the same time.

'_This is worse than the first day we met and he pulled that "fear-me-I'm-a-badass-biker-yo" thing on me. **Much** worse, lemme tell ya. Well, back then we only fucked with each other for the sheer fun of it, or at least I did. I suppose you could say the situation's a bit different now. I would've never allowed anyone else to talk to me the way he did yesterday without makin' sure they end up in the fuckin' hospital wing. Does that like... make him special or something?'_

Cringing, Seifer reached into the back pocket of his jeans and jerked out his wallet. The vending machine had finally come in sight, and it promised Seifer relief from his alarming thoughts, as well as Squall's rigid silence. Pulling out a few crinkled dollar bills as he halted, he turned around to his brunette friend, who had stopped short somewhere behind him and was intently studying the floor pattern.

"What do ya want?"

Squall's gaze twitched upwards and he looked unsure for a second, before he tilted his head and replied vaguely "Uh... water. But... I can get it myself."

When the dark haired boy reached for his own money, Seifer demonstratively rolled his eyes at him and gave a snort of indignation.

"Don't be ridiculous," he chortled, a glimpse of his usual jaunty self sparking up. "It's just a drink."

The brunette paused, one hand wrapped around his wallet, seemingly trying to decide whether he should accept Seifer's treat or not. Eventually, he removed his hand from his pocket and said, in a very quiet kind of tone, "... Whatever."

Squall hated it when other people paid so much as a single dime in his stead, but after what had come to pass between him and Seifer the day before, the very last thing he felt inclined to do was to argue over something as insignificant as a bottle of water. He had hardly been able to form a coherent thought since the blond's stunning entrance back in the art wing, but the one thing he did know was that for once, he did not feel like fighting.

The brunette flinched at the sensation of something cold being pushed into his arms. When he looked up, he was positively staggered by the mesmerizing green of Seifer's eyes gazing down at him, glinting with patience and consideration. The sudden, unexpected sweetness of the sight tugged on his heartstrings so forcefully that he was afraid he was going to flat out fall apart and cry.

'_Shit... **shit**... not here... not now... not in front of... fuck...'_

"Squall?"

After he had gulped several times against the thick, cotton-like feeling in his mouth and the burning sensation in his eyes, he finally managed to trust his emotional strength to hold and took the water from Seifer's offering hands.

"Sorry," he muttered, while staring pleadingly at the plastic bottle that he was holding like a foreign object.

"Don't apologize," Seifer said with his simple, gruff charm, before uncapping his own bottle of Gatorade. "It's okay, you know."

While Squall was still trying to figure out if there was more meaning behind the blond's reassuring grin, Seifer had already scattered his thoughts again by jerking his head to the left.

"Wanna go outside?"

Squall followed Seifer's directive with his eyes and nodded pensively. He didn't know why he was agreeing to everything that the blond suggested, but there was a part of him that just refused to struggle.

"Yeah... sure."

He watched Seifer taking a swig of his violently orange drink and quickly followed the blond as he took off down the hallway once more. He didn't dare to walk next to his older classmate, as ridiculous as that might have looked to anyone who might've been watching. Squall didn't care; he felt as if he was walking around on egg shells - like every step he dared to take could possibly ruin everything.

'_I thought I **wanted** to ruin everything. I thought I wanted nothing to do with him. But... then he showed up and said all those... those things... and now I'm not sure anymore...'_

Quickly, he tried to shut out that terrifying realization, but it was already far too late for such silly precautions; Squall was trailing after Seifer like a loyal puppy dog, allowing the blond to lead him through crowds of students and, ultimately, through a heavy set of metal swinging doors that emitted them outside, into a quiet area of the school yard.

Squall squinted in a natural reaction to the sudden brightness cutting into his eyes; the sun was a radiant golden orb against a cloudless, cerulean blue sky and the scent of flowers in the air was so potent that it was downright intoxicating. Squall wasn't even particularly fond of flowers, but their sweet, lush smell had a relaxing effect on his frayed and tortured mind. It wasn't as noisy outside as it was within the walls of the school buildings, either, which made the brunette feel distinctly more at ease.

Plus, the perks of being away from his stepfather clearly could not be ignored.

Suddenly, he felt a large hand squeezing his left shoulder and a cool hiss of air streaking by his ear. Instinctively, he wanted to pull away, but his blond companion's husky voice and tight grip managed to override his innate flight impulse with ease.

"Hold still."

Squall twisted his head around and noted with surprise how Seifer was trying to shoo a fat little bumblebee from his tousle-haired head. Totally entangled in his own world, the brunette hadn't even perceived the obnoxious buzzing noise of tiny insect wings whirring anxiously by his left ear.

"There."

A content Seifer misinterpreted the strangely empty look on Squall's face and added loudly, while hastily removing his hand from the dark haired teen's shoulder, "Hey, I _know_ they don't sting, okay? I'm just, uh, being cautious. Stop looking at me like I'm some kinda mental case already, jeez."

Squall, however, continued to stare at him, simply because he had no clue what else to do or say. He wanted to say something, he really did, but the words just wouldn't come to him no matter how frantically he racked his mind for them.

He had never felt so lost in his entire life.

"... Right," Seifer finally groaned, when he received no visible or audible response. The brunette's behavior was starting to upset him a little; Squall was displaying the antics of a zombie rather than those of a human being capable of articulating himself.

'_Why is he acting like this? It's not like I forced him to come along. He could at least say something instead of just staring at me!'_

But Squall didn't look remotely like he was planning on ever opening his mouth again. One hand clamped around his water bottle, he just kept ogling the blond teenager out of wide, unreadable grey-blue eyes in which the blankness had become distinctly more pronounced.

Seifer scrunched his nose in disapproval and decided they'd better do something other than stand in front of the school building gawking at each other like two intellectual retards.

"Come on," he ordered firmly as he set off for their next destination, dearly hoping that Squall would snap out of his transfixed state.

Indeed, after a second of hesitation, Squall had managed to pull himself together and willingly resumed his awkward game of tag-along. He didn't know where Seifer was taking him, but found that for a change, he really didn't care.

"There we go."

Squall blinked when he realized that Seifer had led him to the spring where they had once spent an early morning's session of math studies together (which, of course, had gone wrong like everything else they had ever attempted to do together). Now that he was confronted with the memory, he couldn't believe that mere days had passed since then, not months like his mind was trying to trick him into thinking.

'_We've hardly even known each other for a week... this is crazy...'_

"Are you going to sit down, or you just gonna stand there?"

Rocking backwards slightly, he finally noticed that Seifer had taken a seat by the splashing turrets of crystalline water and was looking up at him impatiently. With an indistinct grunt that could have meant a lot of things, Squall quickly sank down upon the cool marble beside him, subconsciously holding his breath when their arms almost touched.

For a long time after that, neither of them did much but take occasional sips of their drinks, listen to the random spluttering of the fountain behind their backs or watch the scarce number of school festival visitors passing by. Squall had slouched forward and was examining the concrete with a newly aroused interest in floor patterns, apparently content with the arrangement of silence between himself and his older classmate. Seifer threw him several overt sideway glances, which, to the blond's disappointment, elicited no effect whatsoever. He didn't know why Squall had accompanied him outside so willingly, but it certainly _hadn't_ been to talk.

'_I swear, I think he's just getting a laugh out of driving me in-fucking-sane. This is probably his sick little idea of fun. Dammit. I mean, fuckin' **c'mon**, I'm tryin' here! Throw me a fuckin' bone, Squall.'_

In reality, Squall wasn't trying to ignore Seifer. The brunette was simply busy trying to suppress the terrors that raged so violently beneath the surface of his everyday life. He hadn't been prepared to meet Seifer again this soon, nor had he expected the blond to treat him with as much kindness and respect as he had. He was more scared and confused than he liked to admit, but most of all he was shaken by the thought that he did not deserve Seifer's gentleness.

Next to him, Seifer eventually heaved a sigh that sounded dangerously defeated.

"Alright, well, I guess if you got nothing to say, I'm just gon—"

"N-no! Wait!" the brunette suddenly blurted out when he saw Seifer's feet moving away from him as the blond stood up to leave. "I... you... uh... Th-thank you."

Both Seifer's train of thought and his resignation came to a screeching halt when Squall raised his stuttering voice at last. Dumbstruck, the older youth lowered his Gatorade bottle to reel around, and it was now his turn to stare at the brunette like a prize idiot.

"... What?" he asked, not sure if he had heard correctly.

Squall, who was still sitting with his elbows on his knees, shyly brushed a few strands of chocolate brown hair behind his ear and cambered his lips into a very nervous kind of smile, without going so far as to face Seifer directly.

"I..." the seventeen year old started, his eyes still fixed upon the ground, "... I said thanks."

"_Thanks_?" Seifer repeated, now at a total loss over this unpredictable turn of the tides. "What the hell for?"

The brunette was spinning his water bottle serenely in one hand, looking so pale and pretty, he seemed almost ghost-like. He was still smiling, though he looked as if he had a hard time keeping it up.

"For what you said... back there. To him. About my painting. I... didn't expect that at all after what I... you know... what I said yesterday. Thanks. Really..."

Squall was simply pressing the words out as they came to him, not quite sure what he was saying at all, or whether his stuttering even made any sense. His heart seemed to be pounding in his throat instead of his chest, which felt deflated like a punctured balloon; he had never quite felt so aware of his body, except for that one night in Seifer's kitchen, perhaps. The memory turned his cheeks hot to the touch, but he was too distraught to even notice.

"You're a strange guy..." Seifer suddenly muttered quietly a few moments into the renewed silence, ulitmately retaking his seat beside the brunette. "You always say the things I least expect from you."

The brunette had no suitable reply to that, so he simply continued to smile that awkward smile of his towards the grey stone surface beneath his feet. He felt Seifer's burning eyes on his body, but his courage still wouldn't quite suffice to allow him to meet the older boy's gaze. The pain in his throat had doubled and his heart was now beating an even more violent pattern against his insides; he was glad to have his bottle to hold on to, because if it hadn't been for that cheap, plastic anchor to reality to keep him grounded, he didn't know if he would've ever lasted this long.

Seifer watched him silently, but contrary to Squall, he had forgotten entirely about the drink he was cradling in one hand. Of all the things he had anticipated Squall to say, "thank you" had probably been amongst the most unlikely ones - settled right amongst "Dude, I love your cock!", or "Will you marry me so I can have your fucking babies?". The quiet, perfectly calm and collected boy sitting next to him now was nothing like the one he had encountered and fought with in the auditorium and on several other occasions - he seemed like a completely different person altogether.

'_But... he's not. He's the same guy I wanted to punch comatose yesterday. He's been the same guy all week, right down to that second I first saw him taking off his helmet in the parking lot. He's just... like this, I guess. You never know what to expect from him, but that makes him all the more interesting in a way. Squall isn't shallow and predictable like everyone else I know. He's cute. He's crabby. He's quick-tempered. He's touchy. He's so many fuckin' things. He's...'_

The blond narrowed his eyes to watch how Squall's hair was swirling lightly in the breeze and how the brunette unconsciously brushed it out of his face, a small frown creasing his features.

Then, it finally struck him.

How could he have ever been so ignorant? From the very second that they had met, Squall had never been a different person - he had never been any less difficult, any more predictable or, for that matter, any less enticing. He'd always been the same, and he'd never pretended to be something he wasn't. What was he trying to do here, anyway? _Change_ the guy? Why? Granted, Squall wasn't perfect by any interpretation of the term, but Seifer had never been interested in 'perfection', anyway.

In the end, Squall Leonhart was just as human and fallible as the next person, and it was wrong to expect him to be anything more than that.

Seifer knew that he would never possess the brunette's emotional range, or even comprehend it, but it suddenly seemed so unimportant. He wasn't here despite Squall's behavior, but quite _because_ of it. Yeah, alright, Squall's words at the auditorium had pissed him off - _a lot_ - but Seifer was willing to move past that. Not because he didn't care, but because he _did_. He had never cared so much.

Why this had never occurred to him before, he really didn't know.

"... I was just standing around when I heard him being an ass to you," Seifer suddenly found himself explaining, his voice swaying evenly with the wind. "I'd been about to take off and go home, 'cause I was bored outta my head, but after hearing all that... I guess I just couldn't. He had no right to talk to you like that. If I hadn't said anything, I would've hated myself for the rest of my life."

Seifer found nothing glorious about this statement, because at the end of the day, it was the truth - plain and simple without any egotistical embellishments - but Squall's head finally snapped up all the same. Seifer was almost stunned by the dazzling azure tint of Squall's eyes, but he figured that this was probably what they looked like when the brunette actually let down his guard.

At last, however, it made no difference at all whether the brunette's eyes were blue or grey or any other color ever fractured by the light - because when everything was said and done, Seifer had fallen for Squall exactly as he was.

"I'm sorry for what I said yesterday..." the brunette suddenly whispered, his inflection helpless and yet full of urgency as he forced himself to withstand Seifer's intent stare. "I'm so sorry, I really am, I..."

But Seifer only smiled, overtaken by a sort of pure, peaceful contentment he had never felt before.

"Don't be."

There was no need for the brunette to excuse his behavior, rude as it might have been, because it was clear that he had meant none of it. Of course, Seifer wanted to know what exactly caused Squall's frequent mood changes, but whether he would ever find out or not didn't seem all that relevant at the moment. He could tell that the brunette was trying to do his best with the difficult situation they were in, and Squall's best was good enough for Seifer.

"I didn't mean... When I said that you were... that I was... shit. I was such an ass, and I didn't mean any of it. I'm sorry, I just—"

The words now came pouring into Squall's mind like a gush of rain, much too fast for his tongue to form and hold them properly. Seifer's enamored grin wasn't necessarily helping his fluster any, and he almost dropped his water bottle when the blond leaned forward slightly and crooned into his ear.

"Relax, okay... It's fine," the eighteen year old whispered with a reassuring half-smile. "Stop apologizing. I know you didn't mean it. It's okay... I promise."

Squall continued to mouth incoherently, but this time, no sound would spill from his lips; the glint of humor in Seifer's emerald orbs and the smile playing at the corners of his mouth had shut the brunette up with astounding efficiency. As rapidly as the senseless cluster of words had come to Squall it had also drained away, leaving him feeling very dumb and empty-headed. Him and Seifer still sat facing each other, their knees mere inches apart and their torsos twisted around in silent expectation.

Things weren't necessarily any less complicated than they had been, but both boys felt unbelievably relieved over the fact that they were still on speaking terms. Perhaps they both grew up a little right then, cowering there on that fountain while gazing at each other in a stupefied trance; perhaps the adults in them finally understood that no matter how hard or dirty they fought, as long as they cared enough to swallow down their pride and apologize from the very bottom of their hearts, they could always make up.

They knew that nothing further needed to be said on the topic. Seifer had accepted Squall's apology, and Squall's burden had been eased tremendously by the realization that the blond wasn't holding a grudge. At that very moment, the brunette didn't care about any of his other problems, because for a few painful hours, the prospect of never speaking to Seifer again had seemed like the most devastating of them all. Squall had once been the type of person who never looked back or harbored regrets, but his cruel words during the fight with Seifer had made him want to turn back time to undo the damage he had done.

For now, however, the woes of the previous day and week had been swept away to be replaced by a sense of peace and tranquility. Right now, Squall didn't care how long this happiness would last. His mind pushed back the memories and protected him from remembering how much he had wanted to believe that hurting Seifer didn't bother him - that it was merely something he had to do to guard a happy family life that had never really been more than a figment of his tainted imagination.

Eventually, the coldness of reality would find its way back to him without a doubt, but for this moment in time, Squall was allowed to savor the blissful luxury of being frightened of nothing at all.

The boys were basking in the warmth of the cooling autumn sun and the flittering chill of the water droplets that occasionally brushed the back of their necks, both taking slow sips from their bottles and smiling at random. They would look at each other and away again, reassured by the knowledge that whenever they would turn, their eyes would meet once more.

Seifer, who was only marginally more accustomed to this lovey-dovey tingle of emotions than his brunette opposite, finally decided to weave out of the silence that persistently lingered between them and said softly, his emerald gaze glued to Squall's lithe frame, "Hey... Squall. No matter what you might think, I like you. I really do. I just... want you to know that."

The dark haired boy's eyes widened ever so slightly as he left the riffled neck of his water bottle tipped against his lips without tilting it to drink. He wasn't quite sure how to respond to this startling, if pleasing statement, but Seifer hadn't expected him to, anyway. With a gentle smirk, the blond jerked his head towards the school building.

"Anyway. So, that was your stepfather, huh?" he aptly changed the subject.

If the topic bothered Squall, he was hiding it well. Taking a sip of his water, he nodded slowly and let his gaze trail off into the distance.

"... Yeah."

Seifer reminisced for a moment to recall the man's face, his voice, his eyes. Frankly, Squall looked nothing like him, but there was someone who _did_.

"Is he Ellone's...?"

"He's her father," Squall finished the sentence, his tone slipping annoyedly without his own volition. "She's only my half-sister, if you wanna get technical about it."

"I don't. Trust me."

The brunette relaxed when he understood that Seifer had meant no harm by his question. Subconsciously, he cursed his own touchiness and vowed that, no matter what Seifer was going to ask him next, he would not launch himself down the blond's throat again. They were treading on thin ice right now, and by all means, he did not want to break it.

"Do you and him get along or what?" Seifer asked evenly, motioning towards the building again. "He seemed a bit, erh..."

For a lack of the perfect term, Seifer waved his hand in a noncommittal gesture and grimaced sourly. The question twisted Squall's insides into a tight knot, but the brunette ignored the painful sensation and retained a wholly neutral expression. Shrugging, he continued to nurse his drink, before he finally sighed, "I guess. I don't know. I don't particularly like him, but he's alright."

"_Is_ he?" Seifer inquired with a curious lift of his eyebrow.

"Yeah. He's not a bad guy. We're just totally different people," Squall answered evasively. "He's a lawyer with no sense for art and creativity whatsoever. He thinks I'm wasting my time, but I guess that's fine, too."

Seifer couldn't quite help the feeling that Squall was only sharing very selective bits about his relationship with Kato Kearan, but perhaps it had been foolish to ask in the first place. It was plain to see that the brunette and his stepfather weren't getting on too well, but the same could be said about Seifer and his dad, too. The blond could recall more screaming fests with his old man than he cared to remember, most of them being over Seifer's behavior, future, clothes, grades and, of course, sexual preference. In fact, a good number of Seifer's ever-casual flings had been invoked by the mere desire to piss his father off.

While Seifer was brooding on his relationship with his old man, Squall had curled one leg to his chest and was resting his chin on his kneecap. The loveliness of the sight immediately cleared the shadows from Seifer's mind and he smiled gently at his friend, a certain rapt cloudiness to his gaze.

"You really are cute, you know," he declared in a tone that came low from his throat and was interlaced with fondness. "Despite the death threats and all that."

"Shut up."

Squall tried to look annoyed, but couldn't quite pull it off. He was far too happy to conjure up his usual scowl and death glare, but that suited him just fine. After all, happiness wasn't something he had the pleasure to experience very often, and in the back of his mind, he knew well enough that it wouldn't last.

"I was kinda worried I'd never get to talk to you again," Seifer said calmly, his eyes screening Squall's face very attentively. "We've had a rough ass week, but... I'll admit, you've pretty much got me hooked."

"Hooked...?"

The brunette returned his gaze, looking more like an innocent, naïve kitten than ever. Of course, he had a vague concept of what Seifer was talking about, but at the same time, he had no clue at all. The blond simply grinned at him, unwilling to elaborate for the time being.

"Hey, Squall. Can I ask you somethin'?"

Squall furrowed his pretty features at the other teenager's deliberately vague question, but after steeling himself against whatever was to come next, he nodded.

"... I guess," he replied hesitantly.

"Just don't kill me, alright?"

Swallowing, Squall grunted, "... Right."

"Okay," Seifer started, sounding only mildly reassured. He was playing with his Gatorade bottle and glanced at the school building as if to make sure that nobody would emerge and approach them to interrupt their conversation, before he finally cut his gaze back to Squall. "Have you, uh... ever been with a guy before?"

"W-what?"

The brunette had flushed a spectacular shade of crimson, and he suddenly looked as if Seifer had asked him to run naked laps through the school cafeteria. The eighteen year old teen just smiled back at him encouragingly, sensing the turmoil that his question had stirred in his younger friend. He knew it had been a risky thing to ask, but Squall had seemed placated enough to give the question a fair shot. After all, the brunette's apology for his rudeness did not necessarily imply that he reciprocated Seifer's feelings, interest or anything of the sort. For his peace of mind, Seifer just had to know.

"What kinda question is that supposed to be?" Squall choked, trying to sound brave despite his fluster.

"Alright, let me rephrase that," Seifer accommodated him cannily. "I guess what I really wanna know is whether I've got any kinda chance with ya, or... uh, not."

"Chance? Uh... what's that supposed to... uh... erh..."

Squall seemed positively frightened now, but since he hadn't completely flipped a lid, Seifer didn't feel too intimidated just yet.

"Well," he interrupted the boy's futile attempt at talking, "You heard what I said earlier... I said I like you."

Apparently, this left the younger at a loss of words, because he no longer even managed to stammer incoherent nonsense anymore. Seifer's question didn't necessarily come as a surprise, since the blond's interest had been rather obvious, but even so, Squall seemed overwhelmed with the situation.

'_What am I supposed to say to that? I-I don't know if he... I mean... this isn't just up to me! He makes it sound like it's somehow just my decision whether we... uh... God. Shit. Who am I kidding here, anyway? He said he liked me, and he looks like he means it, so at this point, I guess it **is **up to me. He kinda put the ball right in my court. But... I don't know what to do.'_

"Look," Seifer sighed, but he continued to sound patient, "I'm not asking you to marry me, alright? I'm just trying to get to know you. I guess what I'm asking is if, say, I had the balls to tackle ya with a kiss and maybe more, whether you'd really go and '_castrate_' me like you threatened you would. I mean, the whole neutering aspect is really kind of a downer."

Squall looked dumbfounded for a moment, before his embarrassment caught up with him once more. He wasn't sure if he could handle what Seifer was suggesting, but at the same time, the thought of crushing what could possibly be between them made Squall's heart sink. In the end, he couldn't deny that being around Seifer felt incredibly fucking good and that his caresses had a sort of healing power on Squall's wounded, tortured soul. Of course, the mental connection to the terrors that he knew so well was close at hand, but just this one time, this one, special minute, Squall was feeling invincible - like he could cope with whatever was to come, no matter how painful or destructive it might be.

And thus, he slowly shook his head.

"No... I guess I wouldn't."

A devilishly satisfied grin split Seifer's lips and Squall inched backwards hastily.

"B-but not here!" he exclaimed in a cutely horrified way, anxiously looking around.

"Hey now," Seifer chuckled. "I have more self-control than that, kitten."

The brunette merely let out a cynical snort.

"Like hell you do."

"Well, the amount of my self-control is directly proportional to your hotness - so don't blame me, cupcake."

With his face still pink, Squall re-focused his gaze onto the concrete. He noticed Seifer adjusting his position so that their knees suddenly came in contact, and neither of them did anything to rectify this. Perhaps it really wasn't so bad, after all; the light touch felt nice, not pushy at all, and anyone happening to walk by wouldn't have thought much of it. They looked like friends, high school buddies, something harmless along those lines, but even though they had never quite made it to a friendship level, they had already progressed far beyond that stage.

Squall was about to submerge himself in that pleasant feeling of mellowness, when a shrill noise in his pocket abruptly shook him out of his stupor.

"What the—?" Seifer said as he jumped.

Frowning, the dark haired teen reached into the back pocket of his jeans and gestured in explanation, "My cell phone."

"Oh."

With a sigh, the brunette flipped his sleek, silver mobile phone open and held it to his ear.

"Yeah? - Hey, Mom. What's up?- ... What?"

There was a pause, during which Seifer studied the brunette boy intently. He could literally watch how Squall's lucid features slipped and a dark veil seemed to drop before his eyes, causing them to look distant and lacking their former luster. The seventeen year old was listening to his mother, who was at the other end of the line, with a stony expression. Finally, he nodded to himself.

"Alright, I'll meet you at the car. - No, it's fine. I'll be right there. - I said it's fine. Don't worry about it. - Okay. See you there."

With that, he removed the receiver from his ear and snapped the phone shut again. He seemed reluctant to meet Seifer's gaze, but finally tilted his head to face the blond.

"What was _that_ all about?" Seifer asked.

"We're leaving," Squall explained tonelessly.

"Huh? Why? Didn't she say she wanted to watch the play or somethin'?"

The brunette shrugged, but he sounded bitter when he spoke.

"We came here in one car, and something came up at my stepfather's office... so... we're all taking off together."

"I can give you a ride home, if you want," Seifer offered promptly, but Squall only grimaced.

"Thanks, but I'd better go."

"But—"

"I don't wanna argue about this, alright?" Squall snapped, his tone suddenly wounding. "Just... whatever. I'll see you at school tomorrow."

He leapt up and swerved on the heel to distance himself from Seifer as quickly as he could, but the blond had risen as well.

"What's going on here?" Seifer inquired, his sober inflection suggesting concern.

"Nothing," Squall sniped aggressively, already stalking down the winding path towards one of the parking lots.

Suddenly, he stopped.

Seifer watched his back rising and falling eccentrically, until Squall finally turned around, his lips forced into something that very dimly resembled a smile. His eyes carried that same, vacant glow from the day before in the auditorium, and it worried Seifer, even if he couldn't quite explain why.

"I'm sorry," Squall whispered throatily, his voice holding an unusual strain but sounding sincere. "I'm not trying to be rude. I just... I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

With his golden brows laced together in obvious disapproval, Seifer said nothing. He didn't understand why the brunette was suddenly so quick to leave, but he knew that he didn't like the abrupt change in Squall's mood. For a while there, the brunette had actually seemed relaxed and happy, but his contentment had been swapped for a kind of agitation that Seifer found nothing short of abnormal.

"Sorry... I really gotta go. Bye."

Puzzled, Seifer watched him taking off in a hurried stride. He had absolutely no idea what to make of this. Sure, Squall had seemed genuinely apologetic for his abrupt departure, but his behavior was just plain weird. Secrecy seemed to be firmly braided into the brunette's personality, and nothing could drive Seifer crazier than a mystery he was unable to solve. He finally felt like he was making some progress in getting to know Squall better, but it almost seemed to him that the dark haired boy made a swift exit every time he got just a little too close.

Frowning, the blond glared down at the empty bottle of Gatorade he was still holding.

"I'll find out what's going on, even if it's the last fucking thing I ever do."

And as he crushed the cheap, clear plastic in his fist, he truly had no idea what exactly he had just promised to do.

* * *

She had apologized to him throughout the entire ride back home, but he would've preferred for her to just remain silent. It hadn't been her fault in the first place. He knew why he had been forced to leave the school festival prematurely; it had nothing to do with his mother. Nothing at all. Squall knew why he was now loitering in the foyer of their home, mentally preparing for the storm that was about to unleash upon him.

"I really could've picked you up later," her voice cut through his thoughts and into his mind as she stood in the doorway, turning to leave. "Are you sure you don't want me to drop you off so you can watch the play? Seifer might still be there! Or why don't you take your bike, hm?"

Squall shook his head for the dozenth time in a row. For a moment, he found himself wondering how Kato had accomplished to have both himself and his wife, who worked part time at his office as a secretary, called out for "an important case that needed immediate attention." Of course, this involved Raine leaving early for the downtown location of their office, while Kato would travel separately to "meet certain witnesses imperative to the case." Perhaps there really was a case, perhaps there wasn't, but it made no difference either way. Kneading his wristbands, Squall forced himself to smile at his mother as she walked out through the door.

"No, I'm okay. Really."

"Well, alright then... I suppose you're old enough to know what you want. I love you, sweetie, see you later!"

"Yeah. Bye, Mom."

Cringing as the heavy oak door loudly locked into place behind her, Squall tried to look unbothered even though he realized that his throat was so constricted that he could hardly swallow. His ears were monitoring the thinning air for sounds that would herald the inevitable course of sorrow that was to come, and he didn't have to listen for very long. A few minutes after Raine had taken her leave, Squall finally perceived the unsettling noise of expensive Italian designer shoes treading firmly over finest marble tiles.

"Well, well, well..."

He barely managed to keep himself from flinching at the cruelty that grated over his stepfather's voice. Very slowly, he reeled around to face the man he loathed from the very bottom of his wounded heart. Kato was standing smugly with his weight balanced on one foot and his arms crossed before his chest in the center of the entrance hall. He had removed his suit jacket and loosened his silk tie, which was dangling around his neck.

Squall's stomach coiled.

"What?" the teen snarled, struggling to keep his voice from cracking.

"Oh, 'what' he says?" Kato imitated him mockingly, sneering when Squall held his gaze. "Will you look at that. Someone's feeling tough today, I see."

The man took a few calculated steps towards his stepson, who was wrestling down the urge to back away. Seeing the boy wince in fear and apprehension sparked within Kato a surge of purest satisfaction, one so powerful it easily overrode how ever many scarce qualms he might've harbored towards his own despicable actions. He felt just like a predator stalking its prey, and honestly, he couldn't have picked a finer victim. His pale, lean-framed stepson much resembled a small, innocent piece of game meat trapped in the sight of a patiently waiting marauder, even if Squall's perfectly grey-blue eyes still bore a pretense of bravery and pride very much unfit for a victim.

"Go to your room," the ebony haired man ordered, his inflection smooth and persuasive in a sick, playful way. After all, this _was _just a game - it would never yield any kind of serious consequences to him, because Kato Kearan played his games far too well.

For a split second, Squall seemed to contemplate offering resistance, but he had long eased into his fate of this repeated degradation. With a graceful twist of his neck, he turned and wordlessly proceeded up the stairs. Kato followed him, but carefully kept his distance, as if to leave Squall with the illusion that he still had some chance at escape.

Squall, however, already knew so much better than that.

The teenager didn't pause when he reached the top of the stairs; with a few, fluid steps he entered his bedroom, which swathed him with the same antsy, creeping sensation that it always did. Unfortunately, this neat, lovingly decorated place he was supposed to call 'home' had stopped feeling like a safe haven a long time ago.

Once more, he turned when he heard footsteps behind him, though their sound was stifled once Kato's feet made the transition from hard wood floor to carpet. This time, Squall did flinch when his eyes met with the icy, dark grey orbs set so deeply into sharp, aristocratic features that would never understand the meaning of the word "gentleness." Thoroughly unkind, the man sized his stepson up and regarded him with a smile as sweet as poison. Very slowly, savoring each step, he approached the tense brunette who was standing near one of his bedroom walls.

"Seifer," Kato suddenly lilted, sounding pensive, his voice swaying with a ghastly kind of melody. "Seifer Almasy."

Squall's breath went shallow as the man incrementally moved into him until their bodies were mere inches apart. His stepfather's stench, masked by expensive cologne, evoked a nausea so powerful he could barely suppress his need to regurgitate; he wanted to run as fast as his legs would carry him, but there was no place for him to go - there never, ever had been. In the end, this was his life, and this was the man who defined his suffering. He had accepted this years ago.

Kato was looking down upon him, smiling oddly. He might have looked kind, hadn't the insanity flaring in his now nearly black eyes ruined the picture. Squall didn't want to hear the man say Seifer's name again, but of course, he figured that his handsome blond classmate had to be the main reason for Kato's strange and alarming behavior today.

"You know, when your mother said you'd be staying over at a classmate's house the other night, I thought you'd made yourself a cute, nerdy little friend," the dark haired man crooned scathingly. "I really kind of imagined a skinny, pale little thing who's into this crap you call art and cutting up his limbs for pastime's sake - someone just like you, you know."

Squall let out a hiss when his stepfather grasped his right forearm and held on demonstratively tight to his wrist, but the man didn't pull, push or do anything of the like; he simply satisfied himself with wrenching his fingers around his child's limb, but he tightened his grip with every second that passed.

"I had no idea this 'friend' of yours would turn out to be a handsome blond football player," Kato snarled, his voice coming much sharper now and the fake sweetness of it shredded at last. "I'll admit, Squall, you very much surprised me there. Do you have a crush on him, is that it?"

For the first time, Squall tried to yank his arm back, but he might as well have tried to break an iron vice. This day, as always, Squall's brave endeavors would buy him no peace or comfort, only more suffering. His blood had turned colder with each of Kato's words, conquered by the incredible chill that dominated the man's temper and soul. Squall was rightfully angry, frightened and desperate, and yet he was also much too proud to fully surrender.

"No," he spat resentfully. "I don't."

Whether this was true or not actually mattered very little. In any case, Squall was not going to grant his stepfather the satisfaction of knowing that he had struck a nerve.

"You don't, huh? Honestly, I find that pretty hard to believe," Kato trilled, but there was nothing friendly or humorous about his tone. "I know you didn't suddenly develop an interest in the sport, so it must be the jock you're fascinated with. I'll hand it to you, he was an eyeful. Didn't look too bright, but hey, you don't need brains to fuck, do you? Squall... Who are you trying to fool here? You have a crush on him. I know you you better than anyone. I can _tell_ that you have a thing for the guy."

"I said I don't," Squall repeated through ground teeth.

"Oh, that's right, you said you don't," the man spoke mockingly, still jovial. "I must not have been paying attention."

But his smile vanished from his lips when he used his leverage on Squall's arm to flip the brunette around and slam him face-first into the wall that didn't yield the boy's weight. He ignored his stepson's muffled yelp of pain as stone and bones collided; with eyes that glowed hot with obsession, he brought his mouth to the brunette's ear.

"Are you fucking him?"

Immobilized by Kato's body pinning him against the wall from behind, Squall could merely gasp in a hybrid of outrage and terror. Trying to turn his head to allow more space between himself and the angry man's lips, he growled in the most defiant intonation he could muster, "I don't know what you're talking ab—"

Squall's breath hitched when Kato twisted his arm in a very unnatural angle and his body went stock still.

"D-don't," Squall whispered unevenly, his face blank and white from the pain, "I swear, I haven't done anything wi—"

"Shut up!" the man behind him barked, tightening his hold to a point where Squall saw dull sparks imprinted in his vision. "Spare me your fucking bullshit, Squall! I _saw_ how the little shit looked at you!"

For a brief moment, Squall was overcome by the urge to cry and scream, to ask why Kato was even interrogating him if he knew all this so goddamn well. But the brunette's persistent silence was only interrupted by his irregular, harsh breathing pattern. He didn't know what to say to explain Seifer's eyes on him, and he didn't want to defend himself. He was well aware that he would pay, no matter what brilliant excuse he might come up with, so what was the point in pleading?

There was none. He knew, because some years ago, he had actually bothered to try.

"I don't care if he wants you," Kato purred against his earlobe, continuously firming his grasp. "That dumb cunt is shit out of luck, you understand that?"

"I—"

"The little fuck thinks he's something special, because he knows what your precious art is all about. Right... precious, _precious_ fucking art..."

Suddenly, Squall found himself being flung out of the room and into the hallway, where Kato jerked him like a rag doll from picture frame to picture frame, yelling hysterically at the top of his lungs.

"Fuck your art, Squall! Fuck it! Look at this shit! Fucking lions! You never draw anything else, do you? Lions! LIONS! Nothing but goddamn, filthy fucking lions!"

Squall was too startled to resist when he was violently being pulled towards the staircase, where more of his pictures lined the walls.

"Your little friend knows _nothing_ that I don't! You hear me? NOTHING! I know you better than you know yourself! I _own_ you, you understand? I _OWN_ you!"

It was difficult to say whether Kato had intended to throw his stepson down the stairs or if it had merely been a predictable accident, but when he shoved Squall towards one of his larger paintings, the velocity behind his thrust inevitably caused the disheveled teenager to trip and lose balance. With a series of blood curling thuds caused by flesh rocking against solid wood, Squall plummeted down the unforgivingly hard steps, until his body came to a skidding halt on the nearest platform.

For several seconds, Squall saw nothing - heard nothing - felt nothing. He lay coiled in a tangled pile of limbs at the foot of the stairs, his lungs aching and his sight momentarily blackened from the impact. He didn't fully understand what had happened, why he had fallen, why he was now in this defenseless position, but nonetheless, he tried to feel for the control of his extremities, if only to steel himself for what was to follow. Gingerly, he moved his feet, his legs, his hands, his arms, his...

As he was laying there on the floor, curled up in a miserable heap, a hot, raw flash of pain shot through his body the moment he made the mistake of trying to raise his left arm. His shoulder was burning with anguish that caused white lights to flash in strobes before his eyes. He didn't know whether he was even capable of moving his arm, but he didn't dare to try again. All blood left his face as he attempted to sit up without the support of his left hand. Cold sweat beaded along his brows, and the effort of holding back the tears stinging his blurred sight and smothering the groan from his lips was almost enough to break him.

Then, he saw those ridiculously expensive Italian leather shoes and black Armani slacks slowly descending towards him. With his heart pounding a violent rhythm in his chest, he continued to struggle against gravity and the sourness in his throat that was trying to coax him into throwing up. His shoulder hurt so much he wanted nothing more than to sob, but he contained every sound deep within his body, holding his head up to look at the man who had inflicted this excruciating terror upon him.

He lifted himself as high as he could and rested his back against the wall to watch how his stepfather approached him. His face pale and his eyes clouded with agony, he forced his gaze to steady. Kato had stopped shortly before him and studied his stepson meticulously, as if to assess the damage that he had done. Squall didn't know how much of it was visible, but he tried hard not to look too pained.

Frankly, he would rather be dead than be at this monster's mercy.

"See," Kato finally drawled, satisfaction oozing from the words, "You shouldn't backtalk me, Squall. People get hurt when you do. You could've broken something."

Squall's breath came in quick, flat thrusts that wavered due to the raw pain that had seized his body, yet he managed to endure his guardian's psychotic gaze. This was one of those times when something behind Kato's forehead had snapped completely, and Squall knew better than to say anything that would aggravate the situation further. Instead, he monitored from beneath fluttering, coal black lashes how his stepfather straightened out his shirt and fastened his tie.

"Time to go to work," Kato declared pleasantly, but his eyes narrowed when they focused on Squall. "Get yourself cleaned up before your mother and I get home. Perhaps I'll return early for a chance to demonstrate how else I reward misbehavior. Yes... yes, that would be quite appropriate, don't you think?"

Squall blinked very slowly, still trying to bite back the tears while he turned inwards. At this point, no threat, whether empty or not, could frighten him. What worried him most was the feeling that something was seriously wrong with his shoulder. It could be broken, dislocated - it could be a lot of things that Squall was downright scared to think of.

"Yes, I daresay that it would be very... refreshing. It's been a few days, after all," the man said vaguely, his voice coated with inappropriate desire. "Well, in any case, I'll be back soon, Squall."

With a cracked sigh of relief, Squall watched him vanishing like a ludicrous nightmare. He listened for the front door opening and closing, then for the sound of his stepfather's car pulling out of the driveway. Only when he was sure that Kato had gone did he allow himself to double over in pain and weep tearlessly as he tried to get a grip on his panic.

'_He's gone... He's gone... Ugh... pull yourself together... you've gotta get up... you've gotta figure out what's wrong... you... unh...'_

Under great strain, Squall managed to push himself up along the wall with his right arm. His knees were jerking as if they were missing the bones, but they didn't buckle. Holding his breath, he carefully smoothed the fingers of his right hand over the grey cotton fabric that covered his shoulder, only to confirm that he had indeed dislocated the joint. It felt wrong, painful and displaced, but worst of all, Squall had no idea how to fix it. Naively, he tried to slip the joint back into place by pushing against the round of his shoulder, but he quickly discarded that idea, as it hurt too goddamn much. Panting, he leaned against the wall and racked his brain for a solution to his sudden dilemma.

'_What am I gonna do? I can't go see a doctor, they'd ask too many questions... Fuck... I-I don't know what to do... I need to get this fixed by the time Mom gets home, or she'll know something happened... Shit, it hurts... What the hell am I supposed to do? I don't know... I don't have a clue... I can't fix it myself, there's no way... I can't even **move** my damn arm! But there's gotta be something I can do... Just **anything**...'_

Squall didn't know whether to blame the idea that abruptly dawned on him like a light in pitch black darkness on his decreased mental status or a sudden onset of stupidity, but it was there, imprinted into his mind, growing more powerful with each passing second. Really, it was absurd, ridiculous, downright laughable - but even so, Squall's brain kept persuading him that if there was just one person in the world whom he trusted even the tiniest bit, it had to be...

'... _Seifer.'_

Squall didn't like this notion very much, but realistically, it was the only one that he had. Perhaps Seifer would be able to come up with some kind of clever idea on how to get Squall out of this precarious situation, because the brunette's mind was as empty as a fresh piece of canvas. He had no other family to ask for help and certainly no other friends, and the hospital was plainly out of the question. The last thing he felt like dealing with was some nosy nurse on a humanitarian trip to save battered children from harm. Squall didn't need anyone to save him - all he needed was someone to mend his goddamn shoulder so he could keep on pretending that his life was perfectly normal.

Inhaling sharply, Squall took a few steps down the staircase. The movement hurt more than he had expected, but regardless of the pain or the nausea raging in his abdomen, he had to get downstairs. After several agonizing minutes, Squall had managed to drag himself into the lobby, where he had to halt and catch his breath. His vision of the room before him was dangerously blurred, but he ignored the possibility that he might've suffered more than just a dislocated joint. Gulping, he approached the phone that sat on an ornate wooden dresser and picked up the receiver. In the end, it took him a long time to wrestle up the courage to finally call the information hotline of the White Pages.

'_I can't believe this... What am I doing?... I've gotta be out of my fuckin' mind, I-'_

When a cool, demure female voice answered his call, Squall almost dropped the phone in shock.

"- Oh... uh, yeah... I need the n-number for Seifer Almasy, please. - That's A-L-M-A-S-Y. - Uh... Deling City. State of Galbadia."

'_This is ridiculous, he's probably not even listed, he-'_

"... What? Y-you do...? Oh... okay... - Uh... cell phone. - Can you transfer me? - Alright..."

Naturally, Squall had been unable to copy down the phone number that the call center agent had provided him with, so he waited quietly until he was directly transferred to Seifer's cell phone number and a slow, even beeping tone announced that he had actually made it through. Squall's heartbeat accelerated with every single mechanic ring tone, and he found himself gripping the receiver more tightly than was necessary as he tried to block out the piercing pain in his shoulder.

'_Pick up... Come on... Please... I don't know what else to do if this falls through... Fuck, I don't even know if this is a good id-'_

"Hello?"

With a jolt, Squall recognized the husky voice that finally interrupted the monotone ring with a bored drawl. He gasped quietly in both relief and uncertainty, and he almost forgot that Seifer could neither see him nor sense his distress, and thus was probably taken aback by his persistent silence.

"_Hello_? Hey! Who the fuck is this? Listen, punk, I've got caller ID and if this is a prank call, I'll—"

"... S-Seifer?"

There was a short pause and Seifer sounded distinctly less hostile when he spoke again.

"... Squall? Is that you?"

"Uh... yeah, i-it's me. I... uh..."

"Wow, hey, what's up, Squall? This is a bit of a surprise, I gotta admit."

"I... yeah... I know. I, uh... I..."

"Hey... you sound kinda weird. Is everything alright?"

Squall blinked a couple of times at the handset he was holding. Maybe Seifer could sense his misery after all, he thought with a start. After all, Squall had tried hard to sound unperturbed, but perhaps his stutter had simply given him away.

"Squall? Hey, what's goin' on with you? Seriously, are you okay?"

"C-can you..."

"Can I what?"

"Can you... can you come over? To my house, I mean. I-I think I... I might need your help... If you're busy though, that's fine, it's not important... It's not a big deal, I just..."

These were some of the most difficult words that Squall had ever been forced to speak in his life, but at the same time, they had been less of a hurdle than he had originally imagined. Perhaps he really did trust Seifer more than he liked to admit. In the end, there was just something about the blond that Squall had never come across before – a kind of raw power and unwavering confidence that seemed to make up for Squall's own, shredded self-esteem.

"I'm not busy, and even if I was, it wouldn't make a difference. What's wrong? Talk to me, Squall."

Seifer's voice sounded sharper now, with a much greater sense of urgency dominating his inflection.

"Well, I... sort of dislocated my shoulder and—"

"You _what_?"

The brunette had to move the receiver a few inches from his head, because Seifer's outraged bark had been loud enough to blast a hole into his eardrums. Clumsily, he tried to explain.

"I... I dislocated my shoulder... Uh, well, I think I did, anyway. I can't move it. It feels, well... weird..."

"How the _fuck_ did you do that? You were _fine_ less than an hour ago! What happened?"

"I... uh... well... uh..."

"Whatever, never mind, just tell me later. I'll be there in ten minutes, okay? I'm on the freeway right now, so it won't take me long."

"Okay."

"Don't do anything stupid, alright? Don't walk around, and try not to move your shoulder!"

Squall grimaced in response, but replied rather obediently, "Okay."

'_It's really not like I **could** move it, even if I was hell bent on the idea.'_

"Gimme your phone number so I can call ya back if I have to. Caller ID says your number is unavailable."

Squall hesitated, but not for long. His phone number wasn't something he normally shared so easily, but then again, nothing about this was anywhere near the realm of 'easy'.

"It's... 661-3827. That's my cell..." the brunette shared the treasured digits slowly, suddenly realizing that he had been carrying his cell phone in his pocket all along.

_'I'm such a dumbass...'_

"'Kay, got it. Hang tight, Squall, I'll be there before you know it!"

"Okay... bye."

When the brunette hung up the phone, he was troubled by the compulsory question of whether he had done the right thing by calling his older classmate and begging for his assistance. Naturally, Seifer would want an explanation for his physically handicapped state, but in the end, what other - let alone _better_ - choice had Squall had, anyway?

'_None, I guess... but still...'_

Sighing and biting his lip as he was met with the jab of pain in his shoulder, Squall sank into one of the comfortable, velvety armchairs that were scattered along one wall of the lobby. Flush with Seifer's order not to do anything stupid, he simply sat there, listening to the stoic ticking of his mother's favorite grandfather clock. The minutes crept by too slowly, testing Squall's quickly draining patience. More than once did he reach for his shoulder, but thought better of it and dropped his hand back into his lap, groaning. He knew that his mother would show up again before long, considering she had to pick up Ellone from her kindergarten trip and take her back home.

What Raine would say if she saw him in this state, Squall didn't even dare to think about.

Finally, after what had felt like eternity and then some, there was an impatient rapping on the door. Squall jumped out of his seat, immediately regretting the harsh, imprudent movement. Hissing a curse, he staggered to the front door and opened it with his one arm that was still fully functional. A blast of warm air from the bright autumn day outside enveloped his body and caused him to grunt in irritation. Blinking, he made out the blurry, dark outlines of a brawny figure before him.

"I'm here!" a hoarse voice bellowed loudly, depriving Squall of the chance to say very much of anything. "I'm here! What happened? Which shoulder is it?"

The brunette arched his brows when his eyes had gradually adjusted to the different light setting and he could actually distinguish Seifer's features. The blond was leaning in the doorway, panting as if he had just completed a full marathon, and his flushed face was signed with worry that he made no attempt to conceal.

"Seifer..." Squall muttered in greeting, unsure of what else to say as he stood there, facing his classmate. The blond anxiously looked him up and down, and his feverish gaze ultimately halted when it raked over the dark haired boy's bare arms.

"Squall! What the fuck happened? Your arms..."

Seifer didn't finish that sentence, but instead narrowed his eyes and strode into the house. Without awaiting Squall's reaction, he carefully brushed his fingertips across the boy's skin, which was covered in ribbons of fresh abrasions and quickly blossoming bruises. For a brief moment, Squall seemed stunned, as if he hadn't noticed those angry blue and red marks before. Then he hastily closed the door and took a half-step backwards.

"It's no big deal," he muttered, but his face had fallen. "Just a few scratches..."

These wounds, however, would prove much more difficult to hide than the scars that had been covering his wrists for years.

"No big deal?" Seifer repeated in a tone of voice that had hitched several octaves. "You're fuckin' kidding! What happened?"

Squall's head streaked to the side as the brunette cast his gaze to a random adjacent wall.

"I fell."

"You fell?" the blond repeated dumbly. "What do you mean, you _fell_?"

His opposite motioned upwards vaguely, "I tripped and fell down the stairs... that's how I dislocated my shoulder, too..."

Various emotions and thoughts flitted visibly across Seifer's face as he studied the brunette's pasty white skin, the bruises and the downright wrong angle the younger teen was holding his arm, but he said nothing. Squall couldn't tell whether the blond believed him or thought better of it, but eventually, Seifer simply sighed and pointed at the door.

"Right, you fell..." the older teen growled almost exasperatedly. "Well, whatever. Just get in the car, I'll take you to the hospital."

"_What_?" Squall shot back, his voice cracking with panic. "But... I thought maybe you could..."

"I could what? Pop your shoulder back into place? Are you crazy? No fuckin' way. I want someone who knows what the hell they're doing take care of ya!"

Squall frowned challengingly in response.

"Are you telling me you don't know how to do it?" he asked with a calculating undertone.

Seifer seemed taken aback by this, and he folded his arms before his chest defensively.

"I do, but my point is-"

"Great. Let's get this over with, then."

Saying nothing further, Squall turned around and proceeded to totter towards the staircase, leaving behind an utterly baffled blond who was still holding his truck keys in one hand.

"But... _hey_!" Seifer yelled after him. "Now wait just a minute...!"

Apparently, however, "waiting" was not a term that existed in Squall Leonhart's vocabulary. With legs wobbly as half-set jelly, the brunette ascended the stairs. He had a much more troublesome time going up than he did down, and every step was sapping his already drained energy reserves.

Seifer, who was still rooted to the spot, saw him struggling, and in all his soft-heartedness, he couldn't help but admit defeat. Where Squall was concerned, he was, after all, just a downright sucker. Grunting in annoyance, he finally took after his idiotic friend.

"Goddamn stubborn brat."

While he fought for balance and listened to Seifer jogging up the stairs behind him, Squall's mind was heavy with worries he found impossible to suppress. He knew he could coax Seifer into fixing his shoulder by taking a swing at his pride, but somewhere down the road, this would come at a price - eventually, the other boy would start asking questions, and he wouldn't be as easily reassured as he had been. Squall had been afraid of this since the very beginning, and he could feel his defenses starting to rise once more. He was foolish for not dealing with this issue on his own, for starting to talk to Seifer again, for growing so attached to a person he barely knew, for...

"Put your arm around my shoulder. The healthy one, I mean."

Surprised, Squall glanced up as Seifer's voice jarred him from his intense thought process. Pursing his lips to a pout, he grumbled, "I can walk on my own, thanks."

"And I can waltz through a daisy field naked, but that's beside the fuckin' point," Seifer bit back, trying to keep up his annoyed grimace even when Squall's face twisted in amusement at the imagery that the blond's playful comment provoked. "Oh, for crying out loud, gimme your damn arm already!"

Sighing under his breath, Squall submitted to the stern order. In the firm belief that Seifer was simply going to assist him with the task of dragging his body up each step, he graciously allowed the blond to lace his right arm around his brawny shoulder.

A second later, he was forced to rectify that thought.

Before he had a chance to object, Seifer knocked his legs out from underneath him and swooped him into his arms without faltering even an inch under Squall's weight. In a rather business-like fashion, he adjusted his grasp on the dark haired teen's upper body and legs and tilted him against his chest, ignoring the physical struggle that ensued.

"H-hey! What the hell are you—"

"Yeah yeah, it's breaking my heart, too," the blond interrupted his noisy protests impatiently, not without grinning faintly when he noticed how nice and close Squall's blushing face was to his own. "We goin' to your room, princess, or what?"

"Yes, no, I mean... _Put me down!_" Squall ordered brusquely, though he quickly came to the conclusion that Seifer wasn't going to do anything of the like.

Feeling rather embarrassed and unhappy with his current position, he promptly decided to resort to more diplomatic measures.

"Come on, this isn't funny... Put me down! Please? Come on! Seifer! Seriously!"

He was unable to wiggle his way out of the older boy's embrace, and it wasn't for a lack of effort, either. The blond was holding on to him quite easily and continued to trudge up the stairs without batting so much as a lash at Squall's physical display of objection.

"Hey, I'm talking to you, asshole!" Squall snapped, but he flinched and fell silent when he made the mistake of trying to flail his left arm.

'_Ow... fuck, that hurt... shit...'_

"Stop moving, you're just gonna hurt yourself," Seifer advised neutrally, before he added, a bit more placidly, "Don't worry, it's not like you're heavy or anything."

"I don't care, alright? Put me down! _Stop_, you moron!"

"No and no," Seifer quipped curtly. "You were the one who came up with the brilliant idea of having me fix your shoulder, so shut up and deal with it."

"But...! I didn't tell you to do _this_!"

"That's right. Consider it a freebie, cupcake."

"Hey, fuck you!"

"Aww. So cute. I'll let ya throw something at me later, I promise," the blond cackled.

When he caught a glimpse of Seifer's smirking visage, Squall finally realized that this was a battle long lost, and sulking, he settled into his fate. He would, however, issue random, offended grunts as Seifer carried him upstairs and ultimately into his room, where the blond carefully set him down on the neatly made bed.

Suddenly, as he felt the crisp white sheets shifting beneath him, it seemed as if the air around them had changed. Their bantering on the way had lightened the mood, but when Squall's fingertips raked over the soft white linen that covered his mattress, he felt nothing short of scared. The numerous quick breaths he inhaled did little to calm him, and neither did Seifer's tall figure towering above him at the edge of the bed. With an emotionless face that was meant to look unperturbed but didn't, Squall gazed up at the blond and drew his eyebrows together.

"Well?" he demanded, his voice hoarse.

"'Well' what?" Seifer retorted evenly, shifting his weight on his right foot.

Squall frowned at him impatiently.

"Are you going to get on with it, or what?"

Seifer noticed the nervous silhouette to the boy's tone. Squall was doing his best to pretend that he was fine, but his performance wasn't all that convincing. His shoulder had to hurt pretty badly; Seifer himself had dislocated his own on several occasions during his football player career. Squall, however, didn't make it a habit to tackle guys twice his size, and his story of having "fallen down the stairs" just had a funny ring to it. He knew of Squall's aversion for doctors, but why hadn't the brunette called his parents instead of him? Where _were_ his parents, anyway?

Just as he was about to ask that particular question, the brunette snarled at him in discontent.

"Will you get a fucking move on already?"

Seifer cocked a brow at the vicious glow in Squall's dark blue eyes and instinctively, he clasped his arms in front of his chest, looking defensive.

"I really don't think this is a good idea," he bit. "It's not like I'm a fuckin' nurse, ya know. Besides, my malpractice insurance coverage ran out last month."

"I don't care, alright? This isn't a fucking joke! Just _do_ it!"

But Seifer was still bristling against the thought of doing anything out of the ordinary to Squall's joints, or any other delicate part of his body. The brunette was acting as if this was just about strapping a bandage on a bleeding wrist, but Seifer deemed it something entirely different. In this particular situation, he was afraid of doing more harm than good.

"Look," he sighed and angled his torso down to the brunette, who inched backwards noticeably, "I don't wanna hurt you, okay? And it's going to hurt like a _bitch_, take my word for it."

This seemed to at least make sense to the dark haired boy, because his expression softened slightly and he moved forward about as far as he had moved back only seconds earlier. His tone, however, was equally determined when he spoke again.

"It already hurts," he admitted reluctantly. "You're just fixing it."

"But—"

"You know what, if you're not gonna do it, I'll fucking do it myself!"

Seifer had to repress a snort of sarcastic laughter; there really wasn't anything funny about the situation, but Squall's comment was just plain ridiculous.

'_If you were able to do it yourself, you would've never called me, princess.'_

He didn't particularly like that notion, but what did it matter, anyway? Squall _had_ called him, which obviously meant that the brunette placed some kind of trust in him and his capabilities. Ultimately, it was probably that awareness of Squall's dependence on him alone that finally caused Seifer to give in.

This time, the blond decided, he would rise to the occasion instead of being flattened by it.

"... Fine," he groaned as he sank down on the bed beside Squall. "You win. I'll do it. Just don't come whining to me if you regret this."

Looking relieved over the blond's change of heart, Squall shook his head. "I won't."

"If this doesn't work, I'll be taking you to the Emergency Room. No discussions."

Frowning, the brunette agreed, "Fine. Whatever."

"Alright. Then listen to me and do what I tell you to."

"Okay."

"Lay down on your stomach and hang your head and arms off the edge of the bed, if you can."

With a confused expression, Squall asked, "Why?"

"Do you want me to do this or not?" Seifer shot back, now sounding as unnerved as he looked.

Instead of giving a vocal reply, Squall immediately lifted his legs onto the mattress and lowered himself into the sheets, where he slowly slid into the directed position. His left arm was throbbing as he tried to let it dangle off the edge of the bed, but he bit back any sound of pain. Then, he laid there, and he was about to complain about his awkward pose when Seifer suddenly scrambled on top of the mattress too and, very carefully so, straddled Squall's back. He didn't shift any of his weight onto the brunette, but Squall let out a gasp all the same.

"W-wait a minute, what are you doing?" the brunette stammered.

Seifer's hands grazed his bruised left upper arm and locked around it very loosely. The blond, however, wouldn't budge otherwise, and just when Squall thought that Seifer was never going to give him a reply, he actually found the older teen breathing softly down his neck.

"Okay, listen closely... I'm gonna pull on your arm so _hopefully _everything will stretch out and the joint will slip back into the socket. I can't promise it's gonna work, but that's how the nurse at my old school did it. I've done it on a few football buddies of mine, and it worked great, but... ya never know."

"Did the nurse sit on top of you, too?" Squall hissed sardonically, his dry sense of humor camouflaging his actual panic.

"No, but this is easier. Trust me."

Squall was taken aback by Seifer's abrupt seriousness. He tried to glance upwards without turning his head too far and, indeed, the blond was looking rather uncomfortable. He was constantly wetting his lips with the tip of his tongue, and his knees kept moving back and forth by Squall's sides. The brunette asked himself, not for the first time, if it had been a wise decision to appoint Seifer with this task. Then again, his list of alternatives had left him rather wanting.

'_Still, I must be fucking crazy... he might fuck up and break my shoulder. Even if he doesn't, I know he's gonna wanna know **exactly** what happened once this is over with. Fuck. I feel like I'm stuck between a rock and a fucking hard place. It's not even like I actually lied to him when I said I fell down the stairs, but...'_

He failed to complete that train of thought, because Seifer's mouth had moved closer to his ear and was whispering a note of warning, "It's gonna hurt, but I'll try to be quick. Just hold as still as you can, okay? You ready?"

Squall had hardly performed a jerky nod when he felt a sharp, downward tug on his arm and the purest, meanest glare of pain he had ever had the misfortune to experience in his entire life. For a moment, his sight faded before his eyes, and then there was a sickening feeling of bones and cartilage grinding against each other as his joint stretched apart and ultimately reconnected. When his humerus bone slipped back into its proper place, Squall could no longer stifle a breathless, severed gasp of pain. His torso flattened against the mattress and his dangling hands clenched to fists, which did nothing to ease his agony.

"Ugh... _God_..."

His body stiffened and shuddered, the involuntary muscle spasms induced by pain and shock. Tears stung his eyes like thorns, and for the second time in two days, he allowed them to flow freely.

Seifer had climbed off his back without his notice. Upon seeing that Squall had managed to move his arm, a tremendous rush of relief had overcome the usually so carefree blond. Of course, he had a good concept of the amount of pain that Squall now had to be in, and it made Seifer's soul ache in empathy. Settling cross-legged on the bed, he carefully rolled the brunette over and gathered him into his arms, his heartstrings pulling at the sight of tears washing in streaks down the younger boy's cheeks.

"It's okay, it's over, it's all done," he crooned softly as he pressed Squall's head against his chest. "Shhh, it's alright. It's alright."

After that, Seifer held him silently as the brunette continued to jerk occasionally, his face hidden behind his splayed out hands and his cries contained behind gnashed teeth. The blond could have kept on talking and cooing senselessly, but what was there to say, anyway? That Squall's pain would soon go away? That it would all get better in the end? Of course it would... but for now, the intensity of it all was enough to reduce the proud, stubborn brunette to a wreck.

At this point, his touch would hold much more soothing infliction on the brunette than any words, yelled or whispered, ever could.

Squall's mind was a strange hybrid of blankness and anguish as he rested curled up in Seifer's arms, crying into a broad shoulder that was his only piece of fragile comfort in this world. Everything seemed to come collapsing down upon him now - his injury, his natural agitation after Kato's outburst, his confusion, his fright... his wish to believe in something he had always thought impossible. If he could've screamed, he would have, but perhaps his body was no longer physically capable of such expression. So he sobbed quietly, too emotionally uprooted to even feel ashamed.

The dark haired boy's fit didn't subside until he finally took note of the pair of lips that was pressed soft and moist against his temple. Strong hands were roaming his body to gently caress just the right places and offer a touch that was more powerful than any sedative.

'_Seifer...'_

Squall realized that the blond was humming some strange, almost melancholic tune that sounded vaguely familiar. He could feel the older boy's warm, sonorous breath ghosting his tear slicked skin, occasionally replaced by tentative, feather light kisses. Without his own volition, the brunette's formerly racing heartbeat slowed, as did his breathing. When he removed his hands from his face, they had ceased trembling almost completely. Seifer was still crooning that subtle melody, in a voice that almost sounded like a purr. Unsurely, Squall tilted his head upwards.

"What is that...? That song?" he asked, his reddened eyes seeking Seifer's, which were so very green and so very, very close. The blond boy was smiling at him wryly, his own, overwhelming emotions showing quite clearly on a surface of bright emerald green.

"Lullaby," Seifer answered hoarsely, before nuzzling Squall's temple once more to hide his own tears and embarrassment. "My grandma would always sing it to me when I was little, and scared of anything that moved. Sorry, I know it's stupid, but it was the only thing I could think of."

"Don't apologize..." Squall whispered, his voice trailing off. "I... don't mind..."

This caused Seifer to smile and rub the tears from his eyes with the ball of his right fist. Suddenly, he felt downright stupid for ever thinking that he could go on with his life as it had been, pretending that he had never met the dark haired boy who was now lying in his arms.

"How's your shoulder?" the blond eventually inquired, raking one hand through Squall's slightly damp hair.

"Fine..." the younger replied with a sigh, carefully flexing his arm. "Hurts, but it'll be alright. Thanks..."

"Good..."

Despite the fact that Seifer was getting pins and needles in his legs for sitting so awkwardly (and having Squall draped across his thighs), he couldn't possibly have cherished the situation any more than he did. Holding the brunette boy really was surprisingly similar in effect to cradling a kitten - it infused him with feelings of peace and gratification, as well as an affection that was so deep, he could almost no longer deny that he was in love with this guy.

'_Love... Huh. If this is the real deal, I suppose it isn't all that bad...'_

Without thinking on it, he placed one crooked finger underneath Squall's chin and tipped the brunette's face upward. Sapphire blue eyes bore into his own past long fringes of black lashes, and that was all that Seifer saw before his mouth pressed to Squall's. He could taste the tears on the dark haired boy's lips as a hint of saltiness on his tongue, but it was perfect, just like that. Squall didn't flinch, and he didn't pull away, and although Seifer had always been an atheist, he firmly believed that in that tender minute when the brunette gingerly reciprocated his kiss, the idea of some placed called 'heaven' was no longer part of a dumb, spiritual fairytale.

Squall was melting into the blond's arms with ease, finding that this embrace was the most pleasant thing he had ever felt in his entire life. He arched into the touch almost longingly, savoring a kind of intimacy he had always denied himself, because he'd been too afraid to be vulnerable - too afraid to care. His fears submitted to passion and his defenses collapsed, at least for a little while. Perhaps the damage that Kato had done was not yet irreparable - perhaps the two boys truly had a chance.

At this moment, neither of them would have ever believed otherwise.


	17. Of Death and Demons

-:-**  
Chapter 17  
Of Death and Demons**

_"I don't give a rat's ass about 'everyone.' I give a rat's ass about you."_  
-:-

"Hey. You sure you're okay? Does it still hurt?"

Squall rolled his head sideways on the starched linen sheets beneath him, frowning at the noticeably heavy arm that was draped possessively across his waist. Seifer had coaxed him into lying down flat on the bed a little while ago, only to flop down and scoot up next to him. He had come up with the pathetic excuse of wanting to massage Squall's hurting shoulder, when really, this was mostly about "cuddling." Squall had to admit that it had been somewhat comfortable to simply stare at the ceiling, only semi-conscious to Seifer's touch, pretending that life was good. Lingering in this room, however, inevitably brought a scowl to the brunette's face and a shadow to his heart. Squall Leonhart could see the demons creeping in the corners of his room that were invisible to anyone else, because nobody else knew what came to pass in the brunette's bedroom when the curtains were drawn shut and the silence became as loud as a gunshot.

"... Squall?"

Flinching when he realized that he had been zoning out, Squall tried hard to focus on the blond lounging next to him, instead of the numbness in his heart. Seifer had a look of concern to his handsome face that he was supporting with one propped arm - a kind of strain that hadn't been there minutes before when they had kissed and nuzzled each other like the lovers they were not.

"What?" Squall finally acknowledged the other boy's presence, his voice calmer than he felt.

"I asked if you were alright."

"... Yeah. I'm fine."

This wasn't the first time that Seifer had asked, and it wasn't the first time that Squall had lied. Sure, the young brunette was doing better than he had been, but in any case, he was still far from "fine." The magnitude of his problems was none to be conquered in a day, a week or, at worst, a _lifetime_. Then again, he had never fooled himself into believing differently, anyway.

_'My life is never going to be normal. I'm alright with that, as long as I can keep my mother and my sister safe. They'll never know what happened here, or what I had to do to keep them clueless.'_

For some reason, Squall found it easier today to deal with the pain that he had kept sealed up inside his heart for years. When he really concentrated on Seifer's face, he could ignore the intense urge to cut himself that overcame him whenever he remained in this room for too long, trapped with his memories. Instead of violently disfiguring himself, he'd rather continue to stay curled up in the crook of Seifer's left arm, soaking up the warmth of the blond's body that was gradually replacing his own coldness.

'_We can't just stay like this, though. Mom will be home before long. And... so will he.'_

Squall sat up abruptly without voicing what he was thinking, causing the dumbstruck blond next to him to almost topple face-down into the mattress. The younger teen paid no attention to his perplexed friend; he shook back his dark brown hair and rubbed his still tear-reddened eyes, annoyed that his skin felt tight and dried out from the salt.

'_I can't believe I started bawling like that. How pathetic. It didn't hurt **that** much. It's not like I'm some little kid or anything...'_

"Hey, what's the matter?" Seifer inquired with a drawl, his chin still perched in the palm of his hand while he glinted up at his friend. "You getting up already?"

Squall looked down upon him quietly and shrugged a wordless, cryptic explanation that was obviously beyond Seifer's understanding.

Sighing arduously, the seventeen year old elaborated.

"My parents will be back soon."

This seemed to make considerably more sense to the blond, because the former, confused emptiness suddenly yielded from his eyes, and he nodded pensively.

"Oh, right..." he murmured, his voice ebbing away. "Where're they at, anyway?"

"Work... they just dropped me off when we came home from the festival and left right after."

"Oh yeah, guess you mentioned that something came up at your stepfather's workplace when we were at school. Must've slipped my brilliant mind."

With an eye-roll, Squall simply replied, "... Right."

Before Squall was able to finally scramble off the bed, however, Seifer had clutched his forearm and stopped him short mid-movement. With a small, but calculating smile, the blond slipped into an upright seating position and silently inched closer to his dark haired classmate. Squall returned his intimidating, predatory gaze in a rather adorably puzzled fashion, even if by now, he honestly should have known better.

Indeed, there was some sense of familiarity to the way Seifer's rasp tongue traced his bottom lip before the blond gently sucked it between his teeth. He nipped at it for a moment, before he proceeded to kiss him both gently and demandingly at the same time. Squall was either too surprised or unwilling to resist, but Seifer's large hand hooked around his neck all the same, pulling him in close. Meanwhile, Squall's fingers clenched into the mattress, as if to oppose the dizziness invading his mind that seemed so obligatory at this point.

'_S-shit... What... I can't even... breathe...'_

Whenever Seifer held him, kissed him and touched him in places that Squall hadn't even known were capable of feeling, it was as if something that had long lain dormant came alive inside his broken heart. Seifer couldn't know, but his teenage understanding of romance, though rudimentary it might have been, and his seemingly infinite patience for Squall's difficult temper were precisely the medicine that the brunette had been in dire need of; Seifer had managed to take him to a place where trusting another human being seemed almost doable - if only for a little while.

When Squall eventually broke their kiss, a feverish glow had turned the mysterious hue of his eyes from slate grey to azure blue. Sitting on his shins on the bed, he could feel his head spinning

'_I've got to... got to...'_

Denying Seifer's alluring touch and hypnotic gaze, Squall hastily slid off the bed. His head spun more than he had anticipated when his feet hit the ground, but fortunately, the sensation wasn't too much for him to handle. On legs not quite yet sure, he stumbled across the room, knowing that Seifer's attentive eyes were following each of his movements. He cursed his shoulder for aching and throwing off his balance, but instead of taking things slowly, he snapped his head up and cast a pretentious look at his blond friend, who hadn't moved an inch from his position.

"Are you coming, or what?" Squall barked with an inflection of deliberate impatience, and the strained bite in his voice caused Seifer to lift a brow.

"'Coming' where, precisely?" the blond inquired, sounding bewildered.

"Downstairs," the younger boy answered. "You should go now."

Squall's pragmatic sense of honesty both amused and irritated Seifer on equal terms. Frankly, he had hoped for a more obvious display of gratitude than the one he was receiving. Instead of being showered with sloppy smooches and clingy hugs from his damsel in distress, he was being chucked out of the house the moment he was no longer needed.

"... Man, that's just plain cold, kitten."

Luckily, Seifer could take the lameness of the situation with a grain of salt; in the end, he found the concept of Squall asking him for help and permitting their kissing fest on the bed - which had lasted for several minutes, might he add - to be quite satisfactory. In fact, Squall hadn't only _permitted_ it but rather played a very dynamic part – for the time being, it was probably all the mush that Seifer could hope for.

Hence, he leapt off the bed and playfully prowled towards his companion, who was waiting statically in the middle of the room. His fingertips casually brushed Squall's left temple as he walked past, sweeping aside wispy strands of hair that had the rich tint of chocolate ice cream and carried the familiar scent of expensive, cinnamon-infused shampoo.

"Well?" Seifer lilted, glancing over his shoulder while he passed through the door. "You coming, your highness?"

Squall's forehead creased at the blond's display of smugness, but eventually, he followed suit. The parts of his body that Seifer had touched throughout the past hour or so still felt like they were burning, but he certainly wasn't going to disseminate that information to the ornery teen; instead, he silently trudged after the blond through the hallway and down the stairs, where Seifer suddenly halted so unexpectedly that Squall could do little but bump face first into the older youth's burly set of shoulder blades.

"_Ouch_," he winced, angrily rubbing the bridge of his nose as he took a half-step back and glared squinty-eyed daggers at his classmate. "Fuck! Don't just stop like that, jerk-off!"

Seifer, however, looked at him with an oddly pregnant air of significance, before he pointed at the staircase.

"So, about what happened, anyway... You said you fell down the stairs?"

Hadn't Squall's face been mostly covered by his long fingers, Seifer might have wondered at the hint of panic that flashed across the brunette's eyes. After the initial moment of surprise, however, the brunette managed to perform a quick nod, mumbling evasively as he dropped his hand, "Yeah, I did. What of it?"

"How the fuck did you manage to do _that_?" Seifer grunted. "You never did strike me as the clumsy type, ya know."

"I tripped over the stupid rug," Squall sighed irritably, clasping his bruised arms before his chest while he shifted his weight from one foot to the other. "It's not that damn unusual. Don't try to fucking tell me that _you've_ never tripped, Mr. Dexterity."

"... I wasn't going to."

"Mind getting your ass in gear then, or what? I'm not in the mood for lectures on how I gotta be more careful and shit. I get it, okay?"

"Hey, hey, no need to get your lil panties in a bunch, cupcake," Seifer said warily. "I wasn't gonna '_lecture_' you, anyway. You're pretty rude sometimes, you know that?"

"I'm not _trying_ to be polite, okay? And stop making up stupid pet names!"

Only encouraged by that comment, of course, Seifer clicked his tongue and ran it across the corner of his mouth, perfectly aware that he had Squall's undivided attention.

"Make me, _cupcake,_" he teased with a grin. "I dare ya."

But Squall only flicked up his right middle finger and snorted in repulsion.

"Like hell, you fucking perv."

While the blond chuckled in cynical amusement, Squall was hoping desperately that Seifer would fall for his cheap diversion and simply forget about prying further for the cause of his injury... though judging by the way the older teen fell silent once more and continued to eye him critically, he was hoping in vain.

'_Dammit, what the hell am I supposed to tell him? He's not buying into it...'_

As Squall was racking his mind for an answer, Seifer was, too; the blond was studying the staircase, Squall's detached expression and, strangely, the pictures that lined the wall. While there was a part of him that thought the brunette's story just didn't add up, he also had a hunch that he was probably reading too much into the whole thing. Quite honestly, Seifer had fallen both up _and_ down several flights of stairs, although he wasn't particularly eager to come clean on it to Squall. Sure, he had never seriously injured himself, but he also believed that he was a little tougher than his pretty, frail-looking brunette classmate. In fact, he figured that it had to take a lot less force to break one of Squall's bones than one of his own.

He had no idea how tragically wrong he really was.

"... Will you quit fucking staring at me?"

Blinking, Seifer turned his focus outward and adjusted it to his now somewhat annoyed looking friend. There was a faint streak of flush glowing across Squall's cheekbones, but his eyes were as dark as the night. Somehow, the brunette managed to look both embarrassed and pissed off at the same time.

"I wasn't staring," Seifer objected evenly.

Then, he slowly moved his feet forward and Squall found himself drowned by the physical presence of Seifer's body that was suddenly only a breath away from his own. Forcing himself to pitch his head into his neck and look upwards, the unnerved brunette flinched at the intensity in the taller boy's gaze, which didn't once stray from his face.

"_Now_ I'm staring," Seifer informed him smugly.

Squall's features twisted helplessly.

"Shut up..."

Sensing that his dignity and self-control were at stake here, Squall spun and made a valid attempt at sneaking past Seifer. He might have succeeded, too, hadn't he resorted to the same silly measure of escape so many times before. Rolling his eyes, a very prepared Seifer simply extended one arm and curled it around Squall's shoulders to reel him in with almost comical ease. Squall huffed when his back came flush with Seifer's chest and the blond's arms engulfed his torso, clearly conveying that running away was not an option.

'_God fucking—'_

"I want you to listen up, cupcake."

Squall was squirming at both the nickname and the way Seifer was breathing down his neck, tickling even the parts of his skin that were covered by the hem of his shirt. Seifer was trapping his arms against his sides, although the blond had no real intentions of keeping Squall hostage if he made any kind of earnest effort to break free. At this point, however, Squall's struggles seemed merely obligatory.

"Listen to _what_?" Squall spat, issuing an offended groan when Seifer retained the claim on his body with the use of just one hand, while utilizing the other to caress his hips and stomach.

"Impatient, aren't we?" Seifer snorted, already distracted by the feeling of Squall's abdominal muscles snapping tight through the thin cloth of his t-shirt.

'_Yup, he's gonna make a break for it. Watch it... I give him about five seconds before he's gonna snap. Five... Four... Three... Two...'_

To his surprise, Squall continued to remain in his embrace beyond that very brief time window. He was sulking soundlessly, of course, but he made no attempt at running away.

'_... He's full of surprises. I should've known.'_

"You're so fucking annoying..." the brunette murmured, his voice strangely dull and flat, like a knife that had been used too many times.

"Yeah, I know..."

As if something had suddenly changed, Seifer slowly loosened his grasp on Squall's frame. The dark haired boy was leaning subtly against him, his drooping hands locked to loose fists at his sides. Seifer couldn't possibly tell what he was thinking – a realization that saddened him much more than he figured it should have.

'_I should stop tryin' to understand what's going on inside his head. There's no point. He probably doesn't even understand it himself.'_

It took no rocket scientist to figure out that Squall Leonhart was shouldering some major issues, but Seifer was neither a psychologist, nor a mind-reader. He could sense Squall's sadness and deeply engrained mistrust, but how was he supposed to know _the reasons _the brunette acted the way he did? The blond was getting weary of prying for answers that Squall was never going to give. At the same time, Seifer couldn't just ignore his concerns, either.

He already cared too much to make believe that he didn't.

Smiling when he noted Squall hesitantly reclining the back of his head against him, the blond silently hooked one hand underneath his friend's shirt. His eyes narrowed at how cold the brunette's milky skin felt to his touch; frigid slashes of muscles contracted once more beneath his calloused fingertips, but still, Squall stayed. He was motionless like a statue, save for the occasional erratic flutter of movement.

'_It's almost like he has to keep himself from flipping out. It seems so damn forced somehow...'_

Seifer didn't like that thought much at all, and he would've preferred to just discard it for the time being, but it had stubbornly latched itself in his mind. Once the blond was brooding on certain ideas, he found it rather hard to get rid of them again. As funny as it seemed, the very premature loss of his virginity could probably be blamed on this character trait of his, too – he had never thought about it like that before, really, and he wasn't even so sure why he was thinking about it now.

'_Yeah, so I was a lil too stubborn and hell-bent on finding out about the whole sex thing when I was younger... but who cares, really? Never harmed me, did it? At least I know my way around now, thank you very much. Maybe that's his problem... he kisses like a cute little virgin, anyway. Then again, who knows, he might've had his heart broken before I came along. Maybe some girlfriend cheated on him? Or he got dumped? Is getting dumped bad enough to be cutting your wrists over, though? And if it isn't, then what **is**?'_

"... I'm scared."

Startled by that hushed, melancholic whisper, Seifer abandoned his train of thought and craned his head around to glance at what little he could see of Squall's face in their current position. The brunette's mouth was a hard, sad line, molded into a shameful grimace. His brows were low over dark blue eyes, which looked narrow and serious. Squall drew a disjointed breath that heaved his chest against Seifer's arm and caused it to fall with a sigh when he exhaled.

He looked so helpless, it just didn't seem right.

"Scared...?" Seifer finally repeated tentatively, unable to believe that Squall had actually conveyed so much as a fraction of his feelings to him. "Of what? Why?"

"I... guess I don't know. Funny, isn't it?"

Squall chuckled cynically, masking his true, unsettling feelings. Disoriented, he ran one of his hands through his hair, careful not to strike Seifer on accident, who was still pressed against him. He half-expected the blond to turn him around, to laugh, or to call him a coward. Something of that sort, anyway. He couldn't even say what had driven him to tell Seifer that he was scared – he had simply opened his mouth and done it. Part of him was trying to distract Seifer from his potentially threatening thought processes concerning Squall's hurt shoulder, but another was reaching out for some kind of deliverance. Not help, precisely, but just something to kill the loneliness he felt whenever Seifer wasn't close to him. He didn't need the blond in his life, but while their relationship wasn't dealing damage to himself or those whom he loved, why shouldn't he permit it? For a short time, at least? What harm could loving Seifer possibly do?

'_... Any, and all.'_

His hand found his temple and he slowly massaged it with his thumb. His head was aching with the strain of trying to take account of his feelings, unfamiliar and scary, as they were. He didn't know what he was supposed to do next. Honestly, he felt as if his insides were ripping in half. No matter how much he thought on the issue, he no longer knew what he wanted, and he didn't necessarily think that it was safe to trust his own judgment at the moment, either.

'_I really am pathetic. I can't do anything right, can I? God, I'm so fucking sick of this...'_

In the end, he came to the conclusion that he was neither able nor willing to make a decision regarding his relationship with Seifer right then and there; he knew that if he'd burn this bridge now, there was a very good chance that he might never be able to go back. He wanted this whole thing with Seifer to stop, but at the same time, he wanted it to go on forever, because it was all that reminded him that he was still alive and capable of feeling. He wanted to experience love and friendship and all the happiness they supposedly included – but he also knew that they came at a price far beyond anything he'd ever be able to pay.

'_If I... actually survive this... I'll...'_

He shook that thought out of his head before his mind had a chance to finish it. This was ridiculous – he had never been one to wallow in self-pity, and he wasn't planning on picking up any new habits. Yeah, his life sucked. So what? He'd deal with it like he had learned years ago, and in the end, things would be just fine, at least for those he had chosen to protect.

To Squall, nothing but his mother's happiness and his sister's safety truly mattered.

"... Actually, Squall, it's not funny at all."

'_Huh?'_

The brunette froze, trying to understand what he had just heard.

"What?"

Seifer's cryptic statement made no sense to him, until he finally recalled his own words from only moments before.

_'Oh... right.'_

"You said you were scared," Seifer refreshed his memory calmly. "What did you mean?"

Squall cringed in response, and he bit evasively, "... Nothing. Whatever. Don't worry about it."

"Look, Squall, don't tell me you're scared and then just blow me off," Seifer snarled softly. "It doesn't work that way, alright? This is a big deal to me."

"I was just kidding," Squall tried to diffuse the situation, shifting uneasily, but Seifer only laughed dryly at his dumb excuse for an explanation.

"Bullshit. You're not the kind to make jokes. 'Specially not over something like this."

"Whatever," Squall sighed, the comeback oddly flat from overuse. "You don't know me, okay?"

Honestly, as much as he appreciated Seifer's concept of caring for him, Squall hated how he always had to explain himself around the blond. Sure, he had himself to blame for this one, because he hadn't managed to keep his mouth shut, but even so... couldn't Seifer just let it go? How could anyone be this goddamn _persistent _all the time, anyway?

"Fine, so I don't know ya. But hey, gimme a fair chance and I'll rectify that," Seifer declared adamantly.

This statement made Squall pause once more. His face screwed up in thought, and he let his unfocused eyes screen the wall in front of him. Seifer's hand was still pressed against his bare skin, tracing arcs and hollows here and there, while his words gradually sank in with the brunette.

'_But... I **am** giving you a chance. Don't you get it? And I don't even know if I can trust you. I don't know what your intentions are... I don't know if you aren't going to fuck me over the first chance you get – or if you're going to mess up everything I've worked for these past years. I don't even know who you really are! I know nothing about you. I don't know if you're worth any of this shit that's going through my head right now! Truthfully, I don't know a fucking thing... Maybe **that's** what really scares me the most right now.'_

Hunching his shoulders into a shrug, Squall bit down a gasp over the pain that hadn't yet dissolved completely from his joint. When Seifer wouldn't budge despite that obvious movement, Squall turned his head so far backwards that he almost got a kink in his neck, only for the possibility to send a death glare his companion's way.

"Everyone's scared of one thing or another," Squall explained, the cool maturity in his voice trying to conceal the pretense beneath. "What's the big deal?"

"I don't give a rat's ass about 'everyone'," the blond retorted. "I give a rat's ass about _you. _What are _you _scared of?"

The smaller boy continued to glare up at him for a moment, before he suddenly cracked one of his rare, deceiving smiles that were little more than a volatile twitch by the corners of his mouth.

"The monsters in my closet and zombies under my bed. Spiders, roaches, snakes and that Ellone is gonna grow up to marry some retard who's gonna be my brother-in-law," Squall rattled off all the clichés that spontaneously came to his mind, although his tone faltered slightly when he spoke about his beloved sister. "There. Satisfied?"

Seifer gazed upon him blankly without saying or doing anything for a long, long time. Squall couldn't determine whether the tall blond was thinking about anything in particular, or if he had flat out fallen asleep with his eyes open and his arms hooked around the brunette's lean waist.

Well, either way, Squall was physically stuck and he didn't like it one damned bit.

'_Excellent. Crowbar, anyone?'_

Surprisingly, the brunette found little need for such crude utilities in order to regain his freedom, because during that second of time when Squall found himself longing to leave the blond's possessive embrace, Seifer wordlessly disengaged his hands and backed away from him. Squall arched an eyebrow at the suddenness of the gesture and the serious frown dragging on the blond's handsome features; unsure of what to make of it, he simply let Seifer pass when the older youth brushed by him to descend the stairs.

'_What the hell...?'_

"... Seifer?"

He had blurted out the boy's name before he had even fully realized why. To his astonishment, Seifer continued to stalk down the steps without heeding his call or turning at least once. The blond's gait was even and determined, but it also seemed hectic at the same time.

'_Why is he...?'_

Not used to being stood up like that, Squall's natural curiosity kicked in and he swiftly decided to follow his classmate to find out what on earth had just happened between them. He was beyond the point where he saw the need to pretend that he didn't care. Looking confused, he shuffled down the stairs after Seifer, who didn't pace himself until he had reached the foyer.

"Hey, what... Seifer, where're you going?" the brunette asked in a rushed tone of voice. "What's up? Why—"

Squall's boots made a squeaking noise on the marble tiles when Seifer stopped unexpectedly a few feet before him, and the younger teen was forced to come to an abrupt standstill in order to avoid a repeated collision. When Seifer swung around and Squall caught a glimpse of the annoyed, pissed off look on his face, the brunette couldn't help but stun backwards, his azure blue eyes widening in disbelief.

'_What the... What's going on here? I don't get it, why does he look so mad?'_

"Seifer—"

But Seifer harshly swiped out one strong arm to silence him, and effectively so. All sound faded from Squall's lips when Seifer shot him a venomously green glare and heaved a sharp, impatient snort while he shoved his fists into the pockets of his jeans, almost as if he was worried he'd use them for something he might later regret.

'_What... did I do...?'_

Seifer seemed to read that question in the nervous lines of Squall's face and the way in which the brunette retreated from him very slowly, because something in his expression changed. Whether for better or worse, Squall couldn't possibly say, but at least the blond now looked semi-willing to explain himself.

"Look, Squall," Seifer finally pressed, trying to keep his voice leveled, but there was a silent hostility in his eyes. "Just for the records, and to get this straight once and for fuckin' _all_ – I'd rather you keep your stupid mouth shut than watch you straight out lying to me with a fuckin' grin on your face! It's pissing me the fuck off, you understand that?"

Baffled, the dark haired boy ultimately became motionless altogether and stared at Seifer with an air of honest confusion, his arms dangling limply at his sides in such a fashion that he almost couldn't feel his shoulder throbbing. Then again, perhaps this absence of physical pain was to be blamed on it having been swapped for the sharp ache that had suddenly erupted in the left side of his chest.

"W-what... Wait a minute, I didn't..." Squall stammered, his voice brittle and the course of his thoughts aimless. "What the _hell_ are you talking about?"

Squall bristled against what he had just heard – both because he didn't fully understand Seifer's unexpected mood change, and because it seemed so outrageously unfair. Just what was Seifer accusing him of, anyway? He'd really been trying – he'd been enduring Seifer's closeness even though it scared him and made him uncomfortable, and he'd tried to answer each of the blond's often intimate questions to the best of his best ability. What the fuck more was Seifer asking from him?

But instead of offering a reply or explanation, Seifer presented him with yet another question.

"You wanna know what I'm scared of?"

The brunette gulped at the piercing and challenging edge to Seifer's tone, but even if the blond's temper put him more at unease than he would have ever freely admitted, Squall eventually brought himself to nod a meek, intimidated affirmative.

"I'm scared of graveyards because they contain nothing but ghosts of the past and depressing memories that are meant to drag you down with them. I haven't been to a single graveyard since I was ten, even though plenty of my close family's kicked the bucket already... Yeah, I'm scared of tombs. I'm scared of a _lot_ of things. I'm scared of getting lung cancer and decaying _completely_ in a matter of months just like my uncle did," Seifer pressed, his eyes burning into Squall's with the brightness of dying stars. "I'm scared of getting Aids because I've slept around so much it'd probably _justify_ as fair punishment. But most of all, I'm scared of getting attached to some snotty brat who doesn't give a rat's ass about me, 'cause he's so fucked in the head that he isn't even capable of giving a damn about _himself_! I'm scared because I don't know what the _fuck_ I'm supposed to do with you, okay? One minute you look like you're fine, the next you look like you wanna take a knife and fuckin' kill yourself right in front of me, and I don't know how to deal with it! _No one _would! This is fucking insane! You put up so many goddamn walls around you that I don't know if I'll ever get through to you, and it scares the _shit_ out of me 'cause I'm fuckin' falling in love with you, you stupid, ignorant little _fuck_!"

If Squall had previously harbored any kind of thought at all, it had just been forced from his poor, unsuspecting mind. Shocked, he moved his lips, but he never actually managed to produce any sound. He felt so helpless standing there, listening to Seifer pouring his heart and soul out before his feet. The blond's eyes were glazed over and he was breathing sharply in and out, staring at Squall with a wild, raw kind of bitterness that the dark haired boy still didn't understand.

Squall couldn't believe what he had just heard.

Meanwhile, Seifer watched the kaleidoscope of emotions flitting across Squall's stark features, finding that none of them appeared particularly reassuring to him. In fact, he had rarely seen the brunette look so thunderstruck and his eyes so devoid of expression.

'_Tsk... Goddammit... Damn this shit... DAMN IT!'_

Seifer had tried so very hard to stay cool and refrain from snapping like anyone else in his position already would have, but instead, he had gone ballistic and yelled things that he already regretted; he hadn't meant to say all this, much less spew it into Squall's unsuspecting face, but perhaps he had overestimated the precise range of his patience.

Opposite of him, Squall was still much too shook up to even produce a logical thought. Scraps of Seifer's verbal detonation whirred through his mind, but to him, they made no sense whatsoever. His own skin felt like wax to him when he clawed his fingernails into his palms, digging for some desperate slice of pain that would anchor him to reality. He easily managed to scrape off the first layer of skin, but even those fresh wounds didn't succeed in driving out the white noise and numbness that were taking over him.

In the end, he heaved a cracked, defeated sigh and sank down upon the foot of the stairs behind him, unable to do anything but listen to the pounding of his own blood in his ears and the lingering shrapnels of Seifer's anger that were embedded in his mind. Through this haze, he wondered how he could've ever been so ignorant... how he could have honestly assumed that Seifer would be able to handle all of his moods and ticks as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

When he lowered his face into his hands, Squall wanted nothing more than to shut down completely, before he'd be consumed by something he couldn't explain... a force, so powerful that he felt he was going to be crushed flat by it. At this point, everything had become so overwhelming that he just couldn't take it anymore.

Seifer watched him, seized by a hybrid of pity and shame. His younger companion had collapsed like a toy, fragile and deflated, unable to bear the burden of Seifer's pent up emotions. Now he was cowering there on the stairs, hiding his face behind fingers stained red by the blood from his own veins.

It saddened Seifer like very few things in his life ever had.

'_I think... I wanted too much... too fast. I suppose I just kind of... lost it. I might have ruined everything...'_

He didn't know what to do now, but driven by the desire to fix as much of the damage as he could, he slowly approached his hunched over friend, whose shoulders were shaking gently.

"Squall," he started quietly, prepared to accept whatever vocal or physical punishment might come his way. "Listen, I... I'm... sorry. I'm sorry for what I said. I went too far. I shouldn't have yelled at—"

"No."

He fell quiet again, surprised that Squall had cut him off with a tone of voice that was much sharper than he had expected. The brunette had lowered his hands and was looking back at him now, pain painted all over his face. Still, there was a strange kind of determination flickering in his narrowed eyes that were bloodshot, but untouched by tears.

"Squall..." Seifer repeated skeptically, parted merely by two or three steps from his friend who looked so hurt that the blond suddenly wanted nothing more than to comfort him.

"No... shut up. I don't wanna hear it," Squall whispered hoarsely, one hand in the air in an unyielding halting gesture.

Those beautiful features that Seifer had been in love with since their first meeting were curling openly now, because the normally flat affect that the blond hated so much had forsaken Squall at last. Neither of them could handle being on this rollercoaster of emotions, but at the same time, neither of them wanted to accept the seemingly much too simple solution of capitulation. They were stubborn and proud, each in their own ways, just as they were confused by their feelings and the feedback they got from the other.

Seifer watched the younger boy out of insecure emerald eyes. The usually stoic, expressionless brunette had dropped whatever defenses he had erected about himself over the years, only because Seifer had snapped and lost his temper. Squall looked so defeated... as if everything he had ever believed in had been destroyed and thrown before his feet.

'_Why do I always have to go around fucking everything up? Why? What's wrong with me?'_

Seifer couldn't know, however, that the angry words he had hurled at the brunette had probably been the most honest and healthy ones that Squall had heard in a very long time. He was suitably confused and traumatized by the blond's emotional intensity, certainly, but watching the older teen's nonchalant façade being wiped and replaced by something infinitely more vulnerable had also caused some of Squall's fears to finally back down.

He wasn't the only one who was intimidated here – he wasn't the only one who was scared.

'_Scared... I... I almost...'_

Again, Squall changed his focus from his own, inner world to Seifer's face. The blond was staring back at him in alarm, as if he was expecting him to either have a mental break down or fling the next best heavy object at him.

But that wasn't his intention.

"I..." Squall choked tentatively, glancing at his faintly bleeding palms before returning his gaze to Seifer. The resignation in his eyes had suddenly been swapped for a delicate kind of affection. "I'm scared of _you_... I'm scared of... being betrayed. I'm scared of what might happen. I'm scared I won't be... that I won't be able to... to..."

He tried to complete that sentence, but for all his strength and bravado, it was impossible to do. His eyes had started to sting again like open wounds and he couldn't swallow. His chest was so excruciatingly tight, he almost couldn't breathe. It hurt so much he could hardly take it.

"I... I..."

As he clawed for words that wouldn't come to him and that his throat would never hold in the first place, his heart was flooded with relief when he heard the muffled sound of footsteps and finally saw Seifer sinking on his knees before him. The blond said nothing; he simply leaned into Squall and wrapped his arms around the brunette's back, holding him so close and so tight that their ribs almost splintered like twigs.

"I'm sorry..." Squall winced, burying his face deep in Seifer's shoulder. "I'm so sorry..."

Seifer pressed his hand on the back of Squall's head, but he remained silent. Even if he had known exactly what to say, he probably would have chosen not to. There was a time for words, but he understood that this wasn't it.

His feelings required no words, and in the end, every single syllable before and after "I'm falling in love with you" had probably been too much, anyway.

* * *

... Just when you thought it was getting easier, eh XD

Don't fret, it is. I just can't bring myself to make this one of these fics where Squall plays hard to get for a day or so, does some obligatory angsting and turns right around to glomp the living shit out of Seifer. It just doesn't seem like a believable transition to me, somehow (imho, neither did Squall suddenly having a crush on Rinoa in the game – but I'll forgive Square 'cause they brought the yaoi fandom Seifer and Squally-poo :3 Hail, Square Enix!). But I'm a terrible nit-picker anyway, so I'll just shut up.

Sidenote #1:

My awe goes out to **Possessed** for writing the longest darn review I have ever laid my virgin eyes (riiiiight n.n) upon – thank you so much for taking however much time it took you to write all that, and congratulations, you made me bawl x.X. I'm such an unworthy, yaoi corrupted soul -.- Thank you muchly, Possessed.

I really can't say this enough... I love all of you for reviewing or even just reading WS – it gives me the energy to finish this monster thingajingy of a story. Thanks!


	18. Tabula Rasa

-:-**  
Chapter 18  
Tabula Rasa / Blank Slate**

"_Scared of heights?"_

-:-

The misty air was shouldering the cool sting of a quickly approaching fall when a dark haired boy quietly eased off the seat of his jet black motorcycle. The leather of his riding gloves felt stiff against his skin, but the ivory skinned brunette cherished the familiarity of the sensation instead of being annoyed by it. Sighing from behind barely parted lips, he removed his helmet and shook the long tresses of smooth brown hair out of his face, before he stoically screened his surroundings out of unreadable, cold blue-grey eyes.

All around the now motionless figure, the Deling City High parking lot was steadily crowding with students and their own chosen means of transportation - namely cars, trucks and a few, far-in-between motorcycles. Squall Leonhart watched them scurrying around for a little while, occasionally distracted by the pain throbbing in his left shoulder, which was aggravated by the weight of the bookbag strapped to his back. Reluctantly shifting in his position, he debated whether he should join the steady stream of teenagers filing into the school building or hang around his bike for a few, meaningless minutes longer.

The decision was taken from his hands when he noticed the blurred silhouette of a person slipping into his peripheral field of vision, just out of the corner of his eyes. He turned his head slightly to see who it was, but when a strong hand was suddenly placed on his right shoulder, the stranger's identity had become all too clear, anyway; there was only one person in the world who was courageous (or foolish) enough to touch him without warning or permission, let alone this early in the morning.

"'Sup, sunshine."

Half turning around, Squall was met with the glaring whiteness of Seifer Almasy's 'good morning' grin and a playful wink out of charming, emerald green eyes. This initial impression of blinding brightness was only accentuated by the fashionable, canary yellow hoodie that Seifer was donning – in addition to a pair of squeaky blue shorts, black soccer-style sneakers and the jock's ever so stylish, slicked back honey blond hair.

'_... Great, there went my fucking eyesight.'_

Squall squinted and thumbed through his mind for a suitable reply to his opposite's cocky greeting. He _had_ believed himself mentally prepared for this encounter, but in the end, the only retort he could come up with was a very skeptic, "...'_Sunshine_'?"

Impossible as it might've seemed, Seifer's smirk only increased in diameter. Squall worried for a brief moment that the blond's face might fall off if he was grinning any harder, but then he reconsidered and decided that watching Seifer's jaw hitting the pavement just might be a worthwhile sight.

"Yeah, like... ya know, my lil flower... my, uh, twinkling ray of light," Seifer chuckled dramatically, his left hand still on his friend's right, unspoiled shoulder. "Something perversely poetic along those lines, anyway."

"... Try calling me your _'lil flower' _just once and find yourself in a coma that you'll never wake up from," Squall snarled acidly, but despite his overt display of annoyance, he continued to permit the blond's touch.

"Still as charming as ever, aren't we, princess?" Seifer laughed. No matter how many times the dark haired biker insulted and threatened him, Seifer still thought that the moody brunette was the cutest damned thing in the world.

The blond's cheerful face, however, hardened almost unnoticeably when his mind abruptly decided to dive into the memory of his and Squall's last encounter, which had taken place at the brunette's home. It had been an intensely emotional and complicated meeting, to put it mildly. Leaving Squall behind on that depressing afternoon had been difficult, but both of them had needed some time to unwind and lick their wounds. Less than 24 hours had passed since their awkward parting that day, but they were already flinging each other crap as if nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened between them.

As if their lives _hadn't_ been completely lodged out of place.

Seifer did, however, notice a few changes that had befallen his younger classmate since the day before; the pure hostility in Squall's eyes had mostly been replaced with a subtle insinuation of wariness. Of course, the slender brunette was sickly pale as always, and he had apparently decided that the fresh bruises that wrought like a helix of indigo and scarlet around his skinny arms had to be hidden from view. The painful looking marks were now safely covered beneath the long, narrow sleeves of the black shirt that protruded beyond the cuffs of his jacket, divulging nothing of Squall's anguish.

Despite his healing injuries, Squall looked distinctly more collected than he had cowering at the bottom of the staircase in his home; he had been downright miserable then. Seifer didn't exactly foresee him openly laying out his feelings like that again any time soon, but he was fine with that, too. The two of them had seen very intimate snapshots of each other's souls that day and discovered things that they both generally preferred to keep invisible to the public. In a sense, that emotional striptease had heralded a turn of the tides, and very few things between them were the same as they had been.

Seifer could tell by the soft, pensive glow bleeding through the residue of coldness in the brunette's eyes that Squall's thoughts right then weren't so much different from his own. Smiling, he squeezed the shorter boy's shoulder in a slow, affectionate manner, before he retracted his hand and guided it to the strap of his backpack.

"Fuck, almost 7:45 _already_," he drawled lazily as he spared a glance at his wrist watch. "Man. Let's go, I guess."

Squall's unsure gaze followed him as he eased past the black Honda and stepped up on the sidewalk, where he paused and briefly looked back.

"What's up?" Seifer asked lightly. "Come on, let's get going."

The brunette's disoriented expression suggested that his mind was someplace entirely different and not trapped in the reality of this overcrowded parking lot. He was holding his motorcycle helmet limply by his side, and although he looked gorgeous in his black boots, dark blue jeans and leather jacket that clung to his slim figure, there was also that reclusive, strained aura that seemed to be a permanent part of him. With much effort, Seifer prevented his smirk from slipping at the sight, although deep down, he wanted to throw some kind of fit.

'_If I could do more than just put my hand on your shoulder to reassure you that everything's alright, kitten, I **would**, trust me. I just can't. Not here, anyway.'_

Squall would never admit to needing physical affection just as badly as every other damn human being on the planet, but Seifer could easily figure out as much on his own. It was obvious that Squall truly was as scared of him as he had claimed. In spite of the blond's good intentions, he might've had all right to be afraid - Seifer didn't know, because he hadn't unraveled that much about the boy's life and past just yet. He figured that maybe the brunette really _had_ been dumped or had his heart broken, or maybe the reason for his distant behavior was something entirely different.

In any case... when it came to Squall, Seifer was no longer just a narcissistic playboy who didn't give a flying fuck about anyone but himself and his own pleasure - he was ready to devote all of his attention to one person alone, and to provide the brunette with whatever it was that he needed or desired.

Something in Squall's mind seemed to lock into place at last, because he suddenly jerked out of his catatonic stupor and joined Seifer on the narrow, concrete sidewalk, avoiding other students as they pushed by. The brunette's long, dark bangs seemed to fall more messily into his finely cut face than usual, but Seifer decided that perhaps he was simply studying Squall more meticulously than he'd normally allow himself to.

'_Hey, I practically told him I was in love with him... I suppose there really isn't any need to play it cool in front of him anymore. He **knows**, or at least he should...'_

"Love"... he still couldn't fully believe that he had actually blurted out that formerly so dreaded word. Numerous lovers and flings from his past would've happily drugged and beat him into submission to force that overrated term out of his reluctant mouth, but not Squall Leonhart - the attractive brunette could toss his switches entirely without the aid of violence or illegal psychedelics.

'_I hate to say it, but right now he's totally got the upper hand here. Worst of all, it's my fuckin' fault to begin with. I just **couldn't** keep my fuckin' mouth shut, could I?'_

In the end, however, Seifer didn't feel nearly as bitter as he might've sounded. Everything he'd told Squall had been perfectly true, and while his revelations had put the blond into a much more vulnerable position, they had also made him stronger and braver in many countless, valuable aspects.

Aside from that, his once so boring life had suddenly become a whole lot more exciting.

'_Well, he certainly puts an interesting twist to getting up and goin' to school in the morning, that's for damn sure. I mean, hell, I was actually **looking forward **to it! Uh, to seeing him, that is. Not class, of course. Seriously, though... the things I'm willing to put up with! I be damned.'_

While the blond was revering in silence, Squall studied him warily from his unfavorable position that was about five inches below Seifer's eye level. He was somewhat surprised to find the blond in such high spirits - grinning and looking like he didn't have one care in the world.

The older youth's disposition had definitely changed for the better since their last encounter.

The day before, after Seifer had caved and screamed at him at his house, the typically nonchalant blond hadn't laughed or at least _smiled_ even once. Instead, he had fallen into a bizarre state of remorse and hugged him on the stairs like there was going to be no tomorrow. But then, after all that, Seifer had somehow reclaimed custody over his emotions and pulled himself and Squall into a standing position... if only to make all the right promises that were just bound to be broken.

¤ **_Flashback_**¤

"_Hey... How are you feeling now?"_

"_... Fine."_

"_Don't lie to me. I told you - I fuckin' hate it."_

"_... I guess... I'm... I don't know. I feel... **weird**. I just don't know, okay...?"_

"_Okay. That's fine. Is your shoulder alright, at least?"_

"_Yeah."_

"_You sure?"_

"_Yeah. It doesn't hurt anymore."_

"_You want me to stick around until your parents come home?"_

"_No. It's okay. I'll be fine. I just... I think I'm gonna lay down for a while or something."_

"_Right. I understand."_

"_Hey, look, I... I'm not saying that I... that I want you to get lost or anything, like I did the other day, but—"_

"_Squall. I know, okay? I know. Just take it easy."_

"_I'm sorry. I didn't..."_

"_You've got nothing to be sorry for, Squall. Not a damn thing."_

"_But you—"_

"_Listen to me, kitten... I'm not going to tell you that I didn't mean what I said back there, because I did. I meant every fuckin' word of it, although I admit that I shouldn't have been such a dick about it. See... like I said before, being around you can be kinda scary, 'cause I swear, you're the most unpredictable guy I've **ever** met in my life. Then again, I guess I only find it scary 'cause... I care about you. I mean, I... I really meant what I said... when I... when I told you that I was... that I... uh..."_

"_..."_

"_Look... regardless of what I said, I'm not asking anything from you. I don't expect you to feel the way I feel, I'm not that retarded. If you want me to stay the fuck away from you, I'll do that, alright? That's your call, and yours alone. Is that what you want...?"_

"_... No. No, it's not."_

"_Okay. I'm glad you ain't kickin' my sorry ass to the curb, I really am... and... and I promise I won't yell at you like that again. I know it wasn't fair and I'm sorry. I really am."_

"_..."_

"_Well... okay... Anyway, I think that's all I have to say for now. So, I guess... I'll see ya in school tomorrow. Take a nap, you'll feel better. Call me if ya need anything else."_

"_... Okay..."_

"_Alright. See ya later, then, Squall."_

"_... Wait."_

"_Hm? What's up?"_

"_Promise you won't..."_

"_What?"_

"_..."_

"_Promise that I 'won't' what?"_

"_... Nevermind."_

"_... Hey. I **know** you're scared. You don't have to pretend that you aren't. I'm scared shitless, too, so it's nothing to be embarrassed over, alright? I really **do** like you, I wasn't messing with your mind. I'm not going to fuck you over. I **promise**, okay?"_

"_..."_

"_Well... like I said, give me a call if you need anything. I'll have my phone on me. I don't care what time it is, just give me a ring if you need me."_

"_Thanks..."_

"_It's nothing. See ya at school, Squall."_

"_Yeah... See ya."_

¤ **_Flashback End_**¤

"... You really aren't listening, are you?"

Swaying unevenly as he sealed the memory of the day before within the walls of his mind once more, Squall forced himself to focus. Apparently, Seifer had walked a few feet ahead and stopped to turn around when Squall hadn't followed. The blond jock was still smiling, though less intently now, as if yesterday was catching up with him at last.

"Somethin' the matter or what?" Seifer asked him with a downplayed note of concern.

Squall thought this a rather needless and provocatively stupid question, but he decided to answer it anyway, even if his reply didn't turn out to be any less shallow.

"No. Nothing."

The blond's jade green eyes were narrowed slightly and clinging to his frame, eliciting in Squall the suspicion that Seifer wasn't nearly as oblivious as he pretended to be.

'_Of course he's not. He was there, after all. How the hell could he **not** be aware of how awkward this is? I feel like shit. I don't even know what to say to him!'_

"You were thinking about yesterday," Seifer suddenly said quietly.

It wasn't a question.

Squall furrowed his brows, trying to figure out how Seifer could be so damn _demure_ about it. The brunette himself had never had such a hard time devoting his attention span to something other than a memory, and he felt anger welling up inside him at the thought of being the only one in this "relationship" who was a pathetic pile of emotional debris. A part of his chest contracted while he glared daggers at Seifer out of sharp, moonstone grey eyes, digging for a reaction of any kind - whether positive or negative, he didn't even care anymore.

"Ah well, whatever. Come on, let's get going already, _slowpoke_," the blond suddenly ordered bracingly. "There's something I've gotta take care of before class starts, so hurry it up. Chop, chop."

For a very brief moment, Squall thought that there was a strange, significant undertone to Seifer's low, husky, 'let-me-bed-you-right-fucking-now' voice. The blond's expression, however, was as nonchalant as it had been, causing Squall to rectify his earlier impression and decide that Seifer was just goddamn clueless. Sporting a suitably irritated grimace, he hoisted his black backpack further onto his shoulders, summoned his last bits of failing courage and set out to follow Seifer towards the school building, not really knowing what to expect.

They walked quietly by each other's side, which did nothing to soothe Squall's agitated nerves. He could've sworn that he saw a couple other students looking at them, probably asking themselves if Seifer was completely out of his mind; how could he be walking right _next_ to the ice princess without turning into a big, blistering frost boil or getting flat out dismembered, limb by sorry limb? After all, Squall Leonhart was flaunting his infamous nickname for very obvious reasons and his wayward temper had never suggested that putting murder anywhere past him would be a very clever idea.

'_Screw them.'_

Frowning, Squall lowered his head and crushed his lips to an aggressive line, deliberately ignoring his environment while he submerged one balled up, gloved hand into the pocket of his coat, the other still cradling his helmet. He could see Seifer whenever he chanced a quick glimpse to his right, and the blond's outline provided enough guidance for him to part his way safely through the crowd without having to look up once to avoid a collision.

"Hey, are you workin' today?"

Squall darted a fleeting look to the side, realizing with rising frustration that although Seifer was talking to him, he was _looking_ at anyone _but_ him.

'_... Screw him, too. He **is** fucking with me - he always has been. It's not like I didn't know any better, either. Goddammit.'_

"Yep," he clipped huffily, sounding perfectly callous without even having to try.

"After school...?"

Again, the brunette could distinguish a certain multi-facetted, elusive note to Seifer's carefully balanced inflection. His pride refused to let him reward the blond with another glance, but his voice softened when he shifted his grasp around his helmet and finally replied, "Yeah. After school."

"I see."

Irritated by Seifer's worthless reply and his stubborn reluctance to savor him with just one goddamn look, Squall allowed his vindictive mood to darken yet another notch, and by the time they had reached the inside of the school building, the brunette was positively sulking. With a few jerky movements that didn't exactly _hide_ his distress, he yanked off his gloves and stuffed them into his pockets, while reluctantly tailing after Seifer through the corridors, glaring violently at anyone who was stupid enough to meet his eye.

'_Where the hell is he going? And what's it to **me**, anyway...? Asshole. Why does he have to be so **dense**? I fucking hate him...'_

Of course, "hate" wasn't quite in the same spectrum of sentiments that Squall _truly_ harbored towards the blond, but he was feeling cranky and acknowledging that he actually _liked_ Seifer simply didn't suit him right then. He hadn't gotten much sleep that night, and being forced to stomach Kato's presence, after the abusive man had eventually returned home in the company of Raine and Ellone, had been nothing short of mental torture. Sure, Kato hadn't made true to his threat to drum his "lesson" any further into Squall for the time being, but at that point, it had made little difference, anyway.

Kato's time would come eventually. It always did.

Squall had spent all of that evening concealing that his shoulder was still imbued with the aftershock pain of a relocated joint and that his pale skin was littered with bruises - and the former had proved to be somewhat of a struggle. At one point, a clueless Ellone had actually tugged on his left arm quite fiercely because she had wanted him to play chase with her, and he had almost lashed out at her in blind anger, it had hurt that goddamn much. Fortunately, he had been able to control the impulse and his family had bought into his cheap charade as they always did, because Squall had a high tolerance for pain, a brilliantly creative mindset and years of experience on his side.

He could fool _anyone_.

Stalking down a hallway that was gradually emptying as students filed into their respective classrooms, Squall felt oddly reassured by that powerful, yet self-destructive idea; knowing that he possessed the ability to trick people into believing whatever he wished instilled the dark haired teenager with something like a rush - a delusional feeling that he was invincible, no matter how many scars he might one day take to his grave.

What he didn't understand, however, was that the slowly disintegrating ground beneath his feet was finally caving in completely, and he still hadn't learned how to fly away from it all.

He probably never would.

"Here we are."

Jarred from his transfixed state by the blond's abrupt and rather pleased sounding announcement, Squall slowly looked up. When realization struck him and he discovered where Seifer had led him during his stupor, his mood instantly ascended new levels of foulness.

"What...?"

'_Is this some kind of sick **joke**?'_

While his pulse beat a much flatter rhythm against his skin now, Squall stared at the door of the lavatory he so often sought out when the nausea quaking in his stomach became too much for him to bear; a twisted blend of the muscle cramps caused by his stepfather's onslaughts, as well as a general lack of food, sleep and blood would frequently put him in that state of near-regurgitation when only sheer willpower prevented him from throwing up wherever he so happened to be standing, and this was the remote boy's lavatory he'd visit whenever he just couldn't take it anymore.

It certainly wasn't the kind of place he wished to be confronted with when his sanity was already down for the count.

Squall wasn't aware of Seifer's ignorance concerning the significance of this room, even if he probably should've been - after all, how was Seifer supposed to know of the agony he associated with this place? To the blond, this was merely one of the spots where he had encountered Squall - one that had stricken him as fairly isolated due to its somewhat inconvenient location. And right now, isolation was precisely what Seifer was in search of.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, only chicks go to the bathroom together, but I really gotta go," the blond declared with a cool smirk and quite more loudly than was necessary. "C'mon."

Squall was bristling visibly when the older teen pulled the restroom door wide open and tried to usher him inside. The brunette didn't like the fierce determination glowering in Seifer's eyes, but he didn't think that putting up a fight and causing a scene in the middle of the hallway was quite an option, either. Thus, while carefully steering clear of any physical contact with the blond, Squall finally squeezed past Seifer and disappeared inside the small, cubicle shaped lavatory.

The bathroom was empty from what he could see at first glance; there were no feet protruding past the bottom of the two toilet stalls, and nobody was washing their hands in the lonely sink. The sound of students chattering outside finally died down when Seifer walked into the room after him and let the heavy, metal door swing shut with a dull thud.

Biting down on his lips, Squall stood a little ways away from the sink and mirror, staring fixatedly upon the grey, patterned linoleum that covered the floor. The walls around him were half painted in a beige color, half streaked with matte white tiles; they were clean, but bland in look and feel, and worst of all, they had stood silent vigil to his darkest, weakest moments far too many times.

'_I don't want to be here. I can't stand it. I've gotta get out of here...'_

Just as the brunette was about to give in to that poignant flight impulse, he finally noted the presence of a much taller and larger frame looming not too far from his own. Albeit being perfectly aware of who the person shadowing him was, Squall whirled around instinctively, his hand clamped around his helmet as if he had every intention to use it as a weapon.

His body froze, however, when his panicked gaze clashed with Seifer's face. Despite his rash movement, the blond hadn't retreated from him or moved aside to avoid a collision. On the contrary, Seifer actually took a step forward, then another, until he was almost touching Squall once more. It was then, when Seifer was forced to lower his head to look down upon him due to their gap in heights, that Squall ultimately realized the change in the blond's posture and expression.

The unmoved, slightly conceited look that had dominated Seifer's face only minutes earlier had been swapped for something entirely different.

"... You really need to stop doing this to yourself, Squall."

The potential meaning behind that sorrowfully spoken order caused Squall to let out a panicked sound somewhere between a gasp and a yelp.

_..: "Stop doing this to yourself." :.._

'_What's he saying? Stop doing **what**? Wait a minute... No, he can't know, there's no way. He can't **possibly** know why I usually come in here! He **can't**. He didn't see anything last time. He has no fucking clue! But... then why is he looking at me like that? This is bad...'_

Squall laced as much fake confidence and coolness into his tone as he could muster when he smiled twitchingly and mumbled, "Huh? The hell? What are you talking a—"

When his back unexpectedly connected with the tiled wall behind him, Squall was actually so surprised that he dropped his helmet with a clatter. He hadn't realized that his backpack had slid off his shoulder and he'd slowly edged away from Seifer, probably due to the fact that the blond had taken small, unobtrusive steps to follow him and not let him out of reach. A frown was wrinkling Seifer's features when he extended both arms and firmly stemmed them against the wall to the right and left of Squall's face, thus restricting the startled brunette's movement.

Whether he liked it or not, Squall had to admit that the blond looked honestly concerned, gazing at him like that out of unguarded eyes and tilting his head down in order for them to be as physically close as possible. At that moment, the danger of the situation and their openly insinuating pose didn't even strike him.

"I'm talking about the way you just completely shut down whenever anything upsets you," Seifer explained calmly, smothering Squall's throaty, threatening growl with the unyielding strength in his voice. "C'mon, you think I can't tell when your head is goin' apeshit all over the fuckin' place like it is right now?"

Squall was squirming angrily in response, but there was no slipping past Seifer's ridiculously muscular arms; he was trapped, unable to move more than a few, trivial inches.

"Bastard, what the fu—" he snarled, but found the rest of his sentence cut off.

"Calm down and let me fuckin' finish."

Despite the stern, commanding edge to his tone, Seifer was smiling kindly. Squall let out a muffled snort of indignation, but eventually, he allowed his panic and the urge to punch Seifer into a coma to slowly subside and digress into something a little more bearable. Of course, the brunette still looked horribly annoyed as he flattened himself against the wall, his backpack resting by his left leg and his helmet laying abandoned somewhere to the right.

"Look," Seifer murmured, now inclining his head further until his cheekbones brushed the soft wisps of hair that swept down along the shallow dip of Squall's temple. "Nothing has changed since yesterday, okay? Not a goddamn thing. I like you, remember? I like you a whole damn lot. I just wasn't sure how much overt friendliness you'd be okay with, considering this _is_ school and shit. I wanted to play it safe, alright, that's all there is to it. I didn't mean to mess with your head or anything. I _know _that's what you were thinking."

Squall screwed up his face and clenched his hands by his sides, still helplessly sandwiched between Seifer's torso and the wall behind him. The blond's breath tickled his throat right where his pulse fluttered beneath his skin, but he found that the sensation wasn't quite as bothersome as it should have been. Apparently, Seifer's ingeniously chosen words of reassurance hadn't failed their purpose; the tight, achy feeling in the left side of Squall's chest was disintegrating and his heart settled for a more peaceful rhythm when he came to understand that just maybe, Seifer had honestly _meant_ every word he had said.

"Whatever..." the brunette finally sighed, the word arrogant in itself, its only purpose to mislead Seifer in the same way that Squall had felt mislead. "Just shut up already... Where are you getting all this stupid psychobabble _bullshit_ from, anyway...?"

He was surprised when Seifer provided him with no verbal response but gently took his pale right hand into his own and directed it to his own, broad chest, where he wordlessly placed it over his heart. Still saying nothing, Seifer simply contented himself with staring down upon the perplexed brunette, his gaze filled with an intensity that nearly dropped Squall to his knees. Gulping, the brunette concentrated on the stoic, drum-like beating of life that was resonating through the thick cotton of Seifer's shirt beneath his palm, and that peacefully intimate sensation finally forced him to surrender to the delicate emotions that he had been trying so hard to deny.

"You really suck, Almasy..." he whispered, his voice merely the husk of a sound as he rested his forehead against Seifer's collarbone, clearly admitting defeat when his lips were upturned by a tiny smile he only half-heartedly tried to repress.

Grinning happily into the mess of dark brown, cinnamon fragranced hair that he was nuzzling, Seifer wrapped his arms around the small of Squall's waist, not at all discouraged by the reluctant limpness of the younger boy's body and the way that the brunette's hand dropped down from his chest and back to his side. Truthfully, Seifer really wanted to kiss the stubborn guy right now, but he was aware that they were running out of time before the beginning of class. Once he'd have a taste of the scrumptious dark haired boy, it'd be decidedly difficult to simply stop there and venture on to a long, boring math lecture.

Fortunately (or less so), Squall suddenly altered the enticing angle at which he had been resting his head and turned it sideways, away from Seifer. Sighing, the seventeen year old cast a quick, unfocused gaze at nothing in particular, searching simply for something _besides_ his classmate's affection to funnel his attention to, when he suddenly cringed in Seifer's arms.

His blue eyes had clashed with their identical twins the very instant that his aimless glare had roved over the large, square mirror above the lavatory sink. Stunned, he stared at his reflection for several long seconds as if he had never laid sight on it before. Of course he was used to seeing his own mirror image glowering back at him - eyes cold as frost, skin white as snow and filigree features that he had hated ever since he could remember - but for some reason, this was totally different from anything he had ever seen before.

He saw himself _with_ Seifer - two very different bodies that were melting together in an embarrassingly intimate embrace of the kind that only lovers should share. He could even see bits of Seifer's handsome features, green eyes closed blissfully and his sun-bronzed face just glowing with serenity. For a moment, Squall truly believed that he was either looking upon a perfectly painted picture or a fleeting snapshot of one of his more pleasant dreams.

Either way, the scene was far too sweet to be real.

The feeling of Seifer's thumbs rubbing idly over his hip bones, however, was _very_ real; the blond's musky scent was real, too. The feeling of his skin was real, his breath pouring like mist down his neck was real, and although this made for a nice array of sensations indeed, Squall was also finally struck by the likely danger of their current position.

"Stop it," the brunette groaned as he turned away from their reflection. "Someone's gonna come in..."

"No, they won't," Seifer replied cannily and Squall could feel the blond producing a grin against his cheek. "I locked the door."

Twitching, the brunette made a rough sound low in his throat that could've easily been interpreted as skeptic laughter and was in fact just that.

"Whatever," he snorted. "You _can't_ lock that door, stu-"

But he broke off when his gaze traveled past the sloped pinnacle of Seifer's shoulder and towards that particular bathroom door. For some reason, he had never noticed the small, iron padlock that could easily be flipped around to fasten the entryway shut. Why on earth the school officials would _allow_ such a mechanism on the main door of the boy's lavatory was absolutely beyond his understanding; as far as Squall was concerned, teenagers couldn't be trusted any more than your ordinary, chainsaw wielding mass murderer.

"What the hell?" he snapped, now pressing his forearms against Seifer's chest to push him away. "You can't do that, asshole!"

The blond raised his shoulders lazily and merely continued to run his fanned-out fingers along Squall's lean midriff, sliding them into the back of the waistband of the brunette's jeans ever so slightly. The denim fabric was slack to his touch, allowing his hands ample room to maneuver. Worried, Seifer wondered for a moment whether Squall Leonhart really ate and weighed enough; he certainly didn't _feel_ like it.

"I _can_ and I _did_," the blond finally replied pragmatically, while manually summoning all of his willpower to keep his fingers from exploring too far down Squall's pants.

"Are you _mental _or what?" the younger boy lashed out at him, his tone becoming high-pitched, throbbing with sudden anger as he tried to ricochet back. "They're gonna think we're in here doing _drugs_ or some crazy shit like that! Goddammit! Get _off_ me already!"

"Calm down," the blond soothed, now tracing the arch of Squall's spine with his fingertips; to Seifer's amusement, his touch didn't even seem to register with the pissy brat. "I just wanted a few minutes alone with you, that's all. No need to freak the hell out. Nobody's even _tried_ to get in yet."

"Shut up, and I'm _not_ fucking freaking out!" Squall spat, the obvious hysteria in his voice belying the words. "Let me _go_! We've got class!"

To the brunette's sincere amazement, Seifer actually appeared to comply with his order; the blond slowly withdrew his hands from his torso, if only to let them travel languidly to Squall's face instead. With a cocked middle and index finger, Seifer brushed away the long, silky bangs that always cascaded into Squall's grey eyes and gently smoothed them behind his ears. The dark haired boy was staring up at him blankly now, his fury suddenly as unimportant as the bolted door. Silently, Squall cursed Seifer and the magnetic, irresistible gaze out of those damned hauntingly green eyes that had him rendered totally immobile.

'_His face is so close... I can smell his aftershave... and I can... almost...'_

Squall thought he knew exactly what was coming next and already found himself shuddering in anticipation, but he was surprised yet again when Seifer merely tilted his head down to him and pressed his soft lips to Squall's forehead, while his strong hands cupped either side of the brunette's jaw, cradling it gently.

'_W-what...'_

The unexpectedly innocent kiss lingered on for a brief moment, distributing sudden surges of warmth and content through every fiber of Squall's averse body. Although the contact was quite chaste, the brunette found himself savoring it as much as any skillfully performed French kiss of Seifer's, even if the enjoyment it induced was of an entirely different kind; this wasn't like sparks of white-hot pleasure racing up and down his spine, striking his nerves like high voltage lightning - it was more like the tender, petal-winged touch of a butterfly delicately fluttering around in his stomach, pacifying the rage in his heart.

Finally, Seifer distanced his face inches from the younger boy's, smiling in a slow, cryptic sort of way at the passionate radiance in Squall's eyes that blatantly betrayed the brunette's common pretense of being nothing but an emotionless sociopath.

"I know we've got class," Seifer cooed, squinting one eye in a playful wink before easing away completely. "Well, let's go then, grumpy butt."

Still leaning limply and slack-jawed against the wall, a dumbfounded Squall was trying to figure out whether Seifer had either gone _completely_ round the bend or was simply getting a kick out of teasing him like this. The heated expression on his angularly cut face and the not-so-subliminal message in his fiery green eyes had suggested raw, carnal _sex _right then and there against one of the toilet stalls, but the ensuing gesture had been as sweet and loving as one could ever expect from an eighteen year old high school kid.

'_I... just don't get him at all. He's like a fucking angel and pervert, all rolled into one. What the hell is his deal?'_

Unconsciously touching his forehead where Seifer had kissed him, Squall didn't manage to pull out of his stupor until Seifer bent down before him and picked his black helmet off the floor.

"You dropped this," the blond said, handing it to him with a suggestive chuckle.

"I know that," Squall hissed furiously, his face suddenly turning hot as his embarrassment caught up with him. Frowning, he yanked the helmet out of Seifer's offering hand and quickly lowered himself to the ground to pick up his backpack and hoist it upon his shoulder.

"Ready?" Seifer asked, fully aware that his amused, taunting inflection was driving Squall up the wall.

'_Aww, c'mon, he's so fuckin' cute, how could I **not** tease him?'_

He saw that Squall was eyeing him warily as he rose back to full height, irritably tugging on the hems of his black sleeves. These were excessively long – obviously a cover-up for Squall's wounds – and Seifer pondered whether the brunette was wearing his wristbands underneath them.

'_That'd be way too uncomfortable...'_

Then again, it wasn't like Squall had much of a choice in the first place where cover-ups were concerned; his scars were quite visible despite the pallor of his skin, and the fairly fresh cuts from only days ago stood out even more so.

'_He still hasn't told me **why** he cuts himself,' _Seifer thought inwardly, a scowl now draped over his radiant complexion. _'I mean, he said he does it to stop hurting or something, but that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. What's really going on? I have like, no clue. Knowing him, he probably thinks this is none of my business, anyway. Tche. Like I care. I'll **make** it my fuckin' business! I'm not going to just stand by and watch him fuck himself up. Who the hell does that? I don't, that's for sure.'_

Squall noticed the fierce determination blazing like a forest fire across the glossy emerald surface of Seifer's eyes, not entirely certain how much he liked it. Everything about Seifer seemed so polarized and excessive, really; his diligence, though mostly admirable, almost bordered to fanaticism. Then again, perhaps it simply took an extremist like Seifer to handle a difficult personality like Squall's.

'_... Jeez, whatever. Seifer's just a big, mule-headed moron. It's not like he deserves a **medal **for putting up with me.'_

Delivering a half-hearted shove to Seifer's side, Squall strode past the blond and quickly unlocked the door. The older boy was hot on his trail, snickering something that sounded vaguely like "you hit like a little girl," but Squall was too eager to get out of the bathroom to take the blond's bait. With a coolly bored sigh, he pushed the door ajar and passed through, resisting the urge to let it fall shut in Seifer's face as punishment for being such a cocky prick.

The hallway before them had emptied completely, suggesting that they had already missed the sound of the bell. Squall, who Seifer figured had probably never been late to a lecture in his _entire life_, looked a tad bit unnerved, but too proud to say anything.

'_How typical,' _the blond contemplated mockingly._ 'He's like a human hyperbole - too proud, too stubborn, too cool, too sensitive, too serious...'_

Seifer threw the brunette an explicit sideways glance that ultimately caused his sneer to slip.

'_... Too fuckin' **hot**. Blah. I'm tellin' ya, this is punishment for all the hearts I've broken ever since I was eight. ... Seven. Six and a half. Whatever! I'm serious, some Frankenstein asshole up there picked the most heartless soul he could find, chose some disturbing neuroses to match, planted it all in one fine ass, irresistible body and named it Seifer's Eternal Suffering - aka Squall Leonhart. I swear, I'm so fucked.'_

With a mourning sigh on his lips, Seifer cast another probing look at his silent companion. Judging by Squall's deadpan profile, the dark haired teen had no idea how much his personality and looks were (and had been) on the older boy's mind. Seifer assumed that he was probably thinking about art, lions or impossibly difficult math equations right now, infinitely clueless about his stimulating effect on the blond.

'_Oh well, I guess things aren't looking too bad... it's gotten better, anyway. We had a **really** bad start, after all. I didn't hate him or anything... but it certainly felt that way at times. He annoyed the piss outta me! Then again, it only took him like six days to get me to admit that I'm fuckin' **hooked **on his shit. And **him**? The little fucker hasn't given away a damn thing! ... Nah, I guess I'm being unfair. He's really been getting better. He's pretty cute, actually, when he doesn't threaten to neuter or kill me. Even if he doesn't say it, I can tell he's into me, at least a lil bit. He might be a good piece of work alright, but I'll get him to submit to my irresistible charm one way or another.'_

"What the hell are you grinning about?" Seifer's 'good piece of work' suddenly bit tartly as they ascended a set of stairs and strode down the last hallway before their classroom. "We're _late, _in case you didn't notice."

"So?" Seifer argued blithely.

"'_So_' I hate being late, asshole," Squall answered, rolling his eyes.

The blond shrugged innocently. "It's your fault for being such a grouch, ya know."

"I didn't tell you to drag me to some stupid _bathroom_!" Squall snapped back, but quickly sealed his lips when he realized that some of the other classroom doors that lined the hallway stood wide open.

"I just wanted to give you a proper greeting," the taller youth leered. "You can't tell me that you don't feel much better now after getting a bit of mornin' _lovin_'."

Squall snorted a contemptuous negative and mimicked a grossed-out shudder, but the embarrassed spark in his eyes and flushing cheeks betrayed him in the end. Seifer, who seemed to regard every moment he _wasn't_ teasing Squall as a moment wasted, leaned over to him as they were walking and draped one arm heavily across the brunette's shoulder.

"No worries," he purred close to Squall's ear, grinning like a Cheshire cat, "I'm saving the _good_ smooches for later today. Just you, me and some, uh... _French lessons_, if you know what I mean. In fact, I'll make you cry my name in _all_ the languages of the world, baby!"

Looking nauseated, Squall tried to sneak out of the blond's smothering embrace by issuing a pissed off snarl and delivering a few well-placed elbow jabs to Seifer's chest, but his struggles stilled immediately when he realized that during their playful physical banter, the ornery teen had steered them straight into their math class, which was already in full session.

They stood dumbfounded in the doorway, Seifer's arm still slung around Squall's narrow shoulders while a classroom of twenty or so fellow students gaped at them as if they were the eighth wonder of the world. Even their puzzled teacher, Edea Kramer, lifted a perfectly plucked ebony brow at the sight of her most antisocial student hanging in a boyish sort of half-hug provided by the latest handsome jock addition of the D.C. High senior class - the same jock, in fact, that Squall had exchanged nasty insults with only one week ago.

'_Well I'll be... isn't this a surprise now? And here I was thinking that those two sitting next to each other might constitute a problem...'_

Edea had already figured that the two teenagers would either end up becoming mortal enemies or the best of friends, at least judging by the intensely _passionate_ way that they had instantly interacted with each other. Right now, it seemed as if the boys were heading for the latter of those two options, and this certainly caused her philanthropic teacher's heart to soar.

Back at the doorway, the reality of nearly two dozen pairs of eyes ogling them finally hit Squall in its entirety and he hastily shrugged Seifer's arm off, hissing "Let go, dumbass!" out of the corner of his mouth while straightening out his motorcycle jacket.

He looked like he literally just wanted to sink into the ground.

Seifer, however, merely switched on a wide, roguish smirk that stretched from one ear to the other, before lazily raising his right hand in greeting.

"Hey, people! Wassup?"

Squall felt the burning desire to either hide his reddened face in shame or smack Seifer hard across his own for his blatant lack of tact, but he managed to bite down both of those urges and instead tried something like a wry, apologetic smile in the direction of their teacher.

"Sorry," he grimaced, ignoring the snickers of some of his classmates in the background. "We, erh..."

"It's my fault we're late," Seifer interrupted him with a casual inflection and an expression of fashionable boredom, as if to emphasize that him and Squall waltzing into class arm-in-arm was nothing even worth mentioning. Of course, he wasn't considering the small detail that everyone in the room thought him a complete basket case for voluntarily putting his arm anywhere near the creepy ice princess.

"Yes, so I see," Edea replied with a tiny smile, slowly twirling a red erase board marker in her long, slender fingers. "Well, hurry up and sit down then. I'd like to continue."

"Sure thing," Seifer agreed graciously and strode off towards the back of the room, a visibly mortified brunette in tow.

When they trudged past Rinoa Heartilly's desk, Squall found himself momentarily fazed by the openly acidic look dragging on the girl's delicate features as she watched them passing by. The brunette boy hadn't forgotten about Seifer's escapade with her at the playground on Friday night, but he was clueless as to whether the blond had spoken to her at all since that night. Frankly, he couldn't see _why_ Seifer would have avoided her; needless to say, Rinoa was one of the most popular girls in school. Squall witnessed other guys fawning over her on a day-to-day basis and, much to his irritation, he always heard the jocks animatedly discussing her "assets" in the locker room. Perhaps Seifer was different, most likely he _wasn't_, but in either case, Squall couldn't imagine Rinoa giving up so easily on obtaining yet _another_ trophy for her ever-growing collection of strikingly hot boyfriends.

'_Whatever. It's none of my business what she does with him or vice versa,'_ the brunette huffed inwardly as he tore his gaze from Rinoa's figure and continued on to his seat._ 'I don't fucking care.'_

Frowning, Squall semi-consciously placed his helmet on the window sill next to his desk and eased out of his leather jacket to drape it over the back of his chair. Trying to make as little sound as possible, he sank into the hard plastic seat and scraped the metal chair legs over the linoleum, eyes fixed upon the front of the classroom. He noticed the quirky cowboy with the long ponytail, Irvine Kinneas, turning in his seat to throw him several outlandish glances, but he decided to ignore the blatant look-over; the auburn haired teen had never precisely struck him for his subtlety anyway, but rather the lack thereof.

'_He was at the playground too, wasn't he...? Him, Rinoa and that other chick, Michelle, or whatever her name is. Yeah, I remember now... they were talking to Seifer after he fell on his ass. I guess they must be friends or whatever, since I've seen them hanging around each other quite a few times. Kinneas was with him at Ward's, too, come to think of it. Hmph. I wonder if Seifer really didn't tell them anything about what happened at the playground... I suppose he never **claimed **that he didn't. I just sort of assumed he'd be decent enough not to. What a dumb idea...'_

A strange kind of queasiness was suddenly lurching in his stomach, but he forced himself to breathe slowly and consciously. He told himself over and over again that it was alright; Seifer hadn't paraded around gossiping about his cutting habits - why the hell _would_ he? After all, it wasn't that exciting of a topic and the blond had (so far) proven to be quite trustworthy.

Perching his chin on his left elbow, Squall subtly turned his head to cast a quick glimpse at his desk neighbor. He had sort of expected to find Seifer looking at him, but to his astonishment, the eighteen year old was bowed low over his table, scribbling something in his notebook.

'**_He's_**_ taking notes? You've gotta be shitting me.'_

It certainly did appear that way, because Seifer would periodically glance up at the board in front of the class, then redirect his attention back to his paper. Squall simply stared at the blond in disbelief, one of his eyebrows lifting further towards his hairline.

'_Who would've thought... that guy is full of surprises.'_

Shrugging softly, Squall decided to follow Seifer's example and retrieved his notebook and a pen from his backpack. Setting those utensils down before himself, he stifled a tired yawn and trained his half-shuttered eyes towards his teacher, when suddenly...

"... Ow...!"

Only somewhat managing to suppress a startled yelp, Squall jumped in his chair and cast a baffled look to the side. Something that had suspiciously felt like a paper ball had struck his right temple, and he didn't have to guess long on who was to blame for the prank.

Seifer, the culprit, winked at him with his right index finger folded flush against his pursed lips. Just as Squall wanted to yell "Don't tell me to be quiet, _dipshit_, you just threw something at me!", he noticed the blond pointing slyly at something under his desk. Growling, the brunette shifted his attention to the floor, finding the wadded up piece of paper that Seifer had obviously used as ammunition.

'_Dumbass, what the fuck? What a retard. How old is he, five?'_

Mouthing a few silent insults at the blond, Squall reluctantly bent down to fish the stupid paper ball out from underneath his table. Up front, Edea was still going off on some mathematical tangent; apparently, she hadn't noticed Seifer launching stuff from one desk to another.

'_Too bad. Watching him get an ass chewing might've been semi-entertaining,' _Squall mused to himself as he absentmindedly unfolded the piece of paper and glinted at it as if it was nothing but a nuisance to him.

Apparently, Seifer hadn't been taking notes after all, because there was a message scribbled across the paper in a very sloppy handwriting that Squall recognized immediately from his task of correcting the blond's homework at the spring the week before. Parts of the message had been crossed out, then re-written, and it took the brunette a moment to decipher the few legible words he could actually make out.

'_Sup Sunshine -_

_How's the air over there? Class is fuckin' BORING as shit. I need another vacation. Anyway, wanna come to the Alclad with me on Friday after school?_

Frowning irritably, Squall turned to a still grinning Seifer and wordlessly shook his head as he folded the note into a neat little square and stuffed it into his pocket. He didn't know why Seifer would ask him on a trip to the Alclad Mountains, but he most_certainly_ had no intention of going. He was planning on working that day, and spending too much time in Seifer's company sounded like a bad idea to begin with.

The blond was eyeing him suspiciously, his brows knitted together when he realized that his invitation had been shot down, before his face suddenly lit up and he resumed hovering over his notebook, obviously to prepare another note of some kind.

'_Oh jeez, what's he up to now...?'_

This time around, Squall managed to intercept Seifer's throw. He caught the second paper ball nonchalantly in his hand before it could have struck his head again or, worse, landed on someone else's desk. The girl in front of him turned very slightly to see what they were up to, but Squall demonstratively paid her no attention. Edea, apparently, was still unaware of their actions, and at this rate, the brunette preferred to just keep it that way.

'_This is like fucking kindergarten. The last thing I need is for her to read the notes out loud in front of everyone or some crap like that.'_

He carefully un-wadded the second message and read it with newly aroused annoyance.

_Why not? Scared of heights, huh?_

_Figures. You're such a dainty little princess._

Again, Squall shook his head at Seifer, if more violently now and with open dislike brooding on the surface of his piercing blue eyes.

Tche. 'Scared of heights?' Seifer didn't know a thing.

Then again, perhaps that was simply a given, considering that the blond was blessed with the IQ of a turnip.

'_Scared of heights... whatever. Dumbass. I don't care if lobotomies have gone out of style, there's gotta be a fucking ice pick out there that has Seifer's name on it.'_

To the brunette's sincere bewilderment, Seifer was grinning at him now, his face framed by fine, short tresses of crop-colored hair. Feeling his skin flushing for no apparent reason, Squall quickly made the note disappear in his pocket once more, while Seifer silently worked on creating his third masterpiece.

When a visibly reluctant Squall ultimately received his next and last message, it turned out to be rather short in length, but far more irritating in nature than the other two that had preceded it.

_Prove it, princess._

Although Squall technically knew better than to fall for a cheap challenge like that, his pride very much told him differently. He was _not_ afraid of heights, thank you very much - he'd climbed the tallest, scariest trees in the park by his mother's old apartment as soon as he'd been able to walk on his own chubby little legs, and he had the scars to prove it, too. As for mountains... he figured that he knew the Alclad _far_ better than his stupid, pig-headed classmate _ever_ would. There were some very windy and twisting roads up there that Squall loved to race up and down with his motorcycle, but he pretty much doubted that Seifer's truck would be able to keep up.

'_Alright then, have it your way. We'll see just **who **is scared of what here...'_

Sneering, Squall clutched one of his pens and jotted down a response on the heavily creased note that he chucked back at the blond so forcefully that it almost landed at the other end of the room. Fortunately, Seifer's catching skills got their moment in the limelight, too; with a stifled gasp, the eighteen year old football player snatched the small paper ball out of the air and flattened it across his desk, looking curious as he read Squall's ballsy reply.

_Fine. I'll come with you, prick. Can you fuck off now?_

With a satisfied grin etched on his face and an unsettling spark in his eyes, the blond shifted in his chair and gave Squall a perky nod. The brunette himself looked pretty bored, as if Seifer was just an annoying brat he was forced to babysit and keep out of trouble or something along those lines. Fine, so they were going to Alclad together - whatever. Squall snorted cynically to himself. Perhaps the trip would be more fun than his typical waiting duties at 'Ward's', and most likely so, but either way, he'd show Seifer once and for all that he was no one to be messed with lightly.

'_Scared of heights my ass...'_

Heeding the eighteen year old with a last long, snide glare, Squall finally straightened up and turned inwards again, his eyes fixed upon the front of the classroom without really seeing anything. Seifer noticed this, of course; he could tell that Squall's mind was somewhere far away, but how in the world the brunette managed to rake in Edea's mathematical blabber anyway was absolutely _beyond_ the blond's comprehension.

'_He's an academic **wonder**, I tell ya. Smart to boot and he's not even tryin'... It's really fuckin' unfair.'_

Letting out a sigh, Seifer studied the blank, college ruled notebook before him and the ballpoint pen in his hand.

'_Ah... fuck. I suppose I might as well...'_

* * *

"Man, that was fuckin' _long _as hell! _God_!"

Rolling his eyes, Squall watched how Seifer was stretching heartily in his chair, almost tipping it over backwards. Alright, the math lecture had been very boring indeed, but Seifer was in no position to complain - after all, he had fallen asleep about halfway through the length of it. Squall figured that if he hadn't kicked Seifer awake after the bell had already sounded, the blond would most likely _still _be snoozing soundly and never notice a thing.

"You're lucky you don't snore," Squall declared scathingly as he stood in front of his desk, shoving his books into his backpack. "I was sort of hoping you'd get caught sleeping. Edea would've had your head on a silver platter. I would've enjoyed the show."

"I figured as much," Seifer snickered back. "That's just like ya, you lil sadist punk."

The brunette snorted a laugh. "What? You thought _I_ was gonna watch out for you or somethin'?"

"Nope, 'cause that would've been the _nice_ thing to do. I know you'd rather watch me get my ass chewed. You'd probably sit there and have a bowl of popcorn while you're at it."

"... Whatever. Be thankful that I woke you up at all."

While he gathered his belongings and shrugged into his jacket, Squall wondered for a moment whether any part of their verbal banter let on the fact that Seifer had hugged and kissed him less than two hours ago in the boys lavatory. Realistically, they probably didn't even sound like friends, but then again, their spectacular arm-in-arm entrance would've suggested otherwise.

'_That was so dumb. What the hell was he thinking, anyway?'_

Looking up, Squall suddenly caught a glance of Rinoa standing motionless next to her desk, her brown eyes fixed on Seifer in a psychotic kind of way. She had never struck Squall as the type of girl who would obsess over one single guy when she could have_ twenty_, but her outlandish expression certainly belied that impression.

'_I wonder...'_

The brunette studied her unsurely from behind his choppy bangs, while pretending to be looking for something in his bag. Seifer had finally removed his ass from the chair and was packing up noisily on Squall's right.

Rinoa was _still_ staring.

Finally, the dark haired girl whipped around, sighing loudly in frustration as she knocked her shoulder into Irvine, who had been weaving his way towards the back of the room. The cowboy looked mildly confused over the rough physical contact and had to pause momentarily to adjust the tilt of his Stetson, before he continued his approach to Seifer's and Squall's tables. Seifer, apparently, had witnessed the scene, too, because he let out an unkind chuckle.

"Man, who the hell rained on _her_ little Barbie parade, anyway?"

"Uhm... no offense, but I think _you_ did, mate," Irvine declared with a good-natured smile as he stopped short between the two boys. "'Sup, Seifer? Hey, Squall."

Squall opted not to say anything at all and instead flirted with the idea of bolting to the door while he still could. Whenever he saw Irvine, he wanted to shove a large, obtrusive object down the cowboy's throat just to keep him from opening his stupid mouth. Perhaps the auburn haired teen wasn't a _bad _person per se, but he more than made up for that lack in character flaws with annoyance.

'_I've lost enough brain cells on **Seifer**, I don't need the freak cowboy for collateral damage. I'm fucking outta here.'_

"What do you mean, _I _rained on her parade?" Seifer asked incredulously, closing the zipper of his rucksack.

The cowboy shrugged.

"Well, she kinda has a crush on ya or something, dude."

Squall couldn't decide whether his brain was already down for the count or if he was simply too interested in this conversation to march off and take his leave. Either way, he continued to feign flipping through the books and notepads in his bag, though he actually chanced a look at Seifer this time, who was frowning at the spot where Rinoa had stood only seconds before.

"She'll get over it," the blond grunted carelessly, not entirely willing to delve any deeper into the topic when Squall was in earshot. The last thing on his agenda was to upset the brunette again, especially over something as meaningless as a night out at the club with the class bimbo.

"Well, see... I was wondering... 'cause a buddy of mine said he saw you driving around town with a dark haired chick on Saturday," Irvine commented, quite cannily even. "I take it that wasn't Rinoa, then, huh?"

"Like _hell_ it was."

Squall cringed visibly when Seifer suddenly flipped his thumb to the left to point it rather unambiguously in his direction.

"Besides, that wasn't a _chick_ to begin with," Seifer lilted, a lazy smirk playing on his lips as he jabbed his finger towards Squall repeatedly. "It was Lord Icy Balls over there."

"Wha- _really_?" Irvine blinked, looking from Seifer to Squall with a curious air as he pushed his Stetson back just slightly for better purchase.

"Why don't you put a fuckin' cork in it, Almasy," Squall hissed, now jamming his books back into the bag. "Jackass."

"Aww. See, he's always _so_ nice to me," Seifer joked, nearly throwing himself at the brunette. "Squall, sweet darlin', your charm had me at hello!"

"Fuck off and die."

The brunette blew against the rogue strands of hair falling into his face, looking irritable as he slammed a few notebooks deeper into his backpack. He neither liked the way Irvine was watching him now, nor how Seifer was still laughing as if this matter was actually amusing. At this rate, Seifer would probably be parading around and sharing details of how he had had his tongue down Squall's throat before long.

'_I'll kill him. I swear to God, his ass will be dismembered and thrown in a garbage bag if he tells anyone.'_

Meanwhile, Irvine was trying to make sense of Seifer's words and Squall's scowl. He did find that the brunette was talking a lot more than he usually would, although he was still quite bitchy and full of nasty little insults. Then again, Squall had always been a bit odd, even before he had gone all psychotic on everyone – even on those who may have once called themselves his 'friends'. Puberty certainly hadn't _enhanced_ his personality, that much was for sure.

'_He really wasn't even too bad before... some years ago, anyway. I mean, he was always nice when all the other kids made fun of my mom... I think he even **defended** me a couple times. Really, he always **was** pretty decent. If he hadn't turned into such a dipshit, I'm sure we'd still be friends. He does seem to be getting along with Seifer, considering they waltzed in here all buddy-buddy and whatnot. They're almost acting like a grumpy old married couple. I wonder if they have something goin' on... I should take them home with me and get a second opinion on that.'_

"What about Michelle, anyway?" Seifer derailed the cowboy's train of thought, who looked slightly dumbfounded at the question.

"Wha-? Her? Oh. Naw. She's really kinda boring," Irvine explained, noting with surprise how Squall was suddenly sneering at him in a disturbingly pleased fashion. Of course, the brunette boy _was_ sort of like friends with Selphie... he'd naturally get a kick out of hearing how Irvine's sidelong flings were nipped in the bud. "I like to rope my girls in, ya know. If there's no challenge involved, then it just ain't any fun. After all, I _am _Irvine the Babe-Slayer! Besides, the crazy broad called me like _fifteen _fucking times on Saturday! Talk about _desperate_, dude. I almost had her number blocked!"

"I told ya to wait until Selphie gives it up. Once a girl thinks you're willing to change for her, she's jelly in your hands."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," said Irvine, his voice trailing off miserably. "I'm working on it."

"... Oi, Squall, where ya goin'?"

The quiet brunette had attempted to sneak by Irvine and to somehow disappear out of sight, but he stopped short when he realized that he had attracted Seifer's attention despite his honest efforts. Sighing, he turned around and glared at the blond from over his shoulder.

"Gym class," Squall declared coolly, clutching his arms in front of his chest.

"Let's go together, then," Seifer decided adamantly, and much to Squall's dismay.

"I have to get my gym bag from the parking lot," the brunette bristled.

"So do I."

For a moment, Squall wondered whether he could pass off throwing his helmet at the blond as an accident. What the hell was _wrong_ with that guy, anyway? They weren't fucking _Siamese twins _or anything, so why was the annoying blond practically attached to his hip these days?

_..: "I like you, remember?" :.._

_..: "I like you." :.._

_..: "I like you." :.._

_..: "I like you." :.._

_..: "Like you, like you, like you, like-" :.._

'_Ugh, **shut up**! I got it, alright! Dang.'_

Wincing in silent despair, he gave in to the nagging voices in his head and made no second attempt at leaving Seifer in the dust. Instead, he waited semi-patiently while the blond hoisted his backpack upon his shoulders and trotted down the aisle between the chairs and tables to follow him.

Irvine, of course, was hot on their trail.

'_Great, now I get to deal with the demented cowboy, too. What on earth have I gotten myself into...?'_

"Oh heeey, by the way, you guys got dates for the ball yet?"

'_... Great. Here we go. Why can't that fucking nutjob ever keep his mouth shut?'_

"The 'ball'? Huh? What ball are you talking about?" Seifer asked blankly as they filed out of the classroom and slowly trudged down the hallway, all three of them side by side with a very reluctant Squall on the left and a cheerful blond in the middle.

"Homecoming, man," Irvine exclaimed gleefully. "It's Friday, next week. Didn't you see the announcement on the school billboard?"

"Nope... must've missed it," Seifer replied slowly, suddenly sounding pensive. Squall wasn't sure how much he liked that changed inflection in the blond's tone; it usually meant that the guy's brain was concocting some new kind of catastrophe that Squall definitely had _no_ desire to be part of.

'_Of course he's gonna want to go to the stupid dance... he's a fricken jock after all. They flock to each other like flies to fucking road kill, it's not even like they need a special occasion. Tche. Whatever. I don't give a damn. He'll probably take Rinoa or some other annoying halfwit. Suits me just fine, anyway. Him and the cowboy can take **each other **for all I care!'_

No matter how indifferent or cold-blooded Squall tried to seem on the outside, deep down he really didn't want Seifer to go out with anyone. Acknowledging this, however, was still a little too difficult for him; he had grown oddly attached to the blond in an extremely _short _amount of time, and he considered it categorically unsafe to get _too_ emotionally involved too fast. He wished he could force his heart to isolate itself against these feelings, to simply not care as much, but the damned thing no longer listened to his wishes and had instead developed an agenda of its own. Seifer was tearing down walls that had taken Squall _three years _to maintain, and apparently, some part of the brunette was thoroughly pleased over this sudden twist in his life.

The rest of him, of course, _wasn't_.

"So, Squall, say... you goin' with anyone?" Irvine lilted.

Squall slowly turned his head at the cheerful question and chose to regard Irvine with an icy glare that was as long and cold as a Siberian winter's night. That single look rendered a vocal reply completely redundant, and the cowboy (to Squall's mild surprise) apparently got the hint, because he paled a shade or two, let out an awkward laugh and quickly changed the topic of their conversation.

"Eh, yeah, uh, right, uhm... woo, class was long as fuck, wasn't it? One down, three more to go. Hehe... uhm... urh... yeah... Oh, here we are! You've got gym class now, right? I, eh, guess I better get to choir then," he muttered, waving at them when they had reached the top of the stairwell that writhed down to the ground floor. "See ya, fellas."

"Later, Irv," Seifer replied neutrally as he watched the cowboy take off towards the other end of the hallway.

Meanwhile, his antisocial brunette friend was already jogging down the stairs, seemingly determined to increase the distance between himself and Seifer. The blond, of course, wasn't shaken off quite so easily, as Squall found out for himself when he felt Seifer prodding him into the side playfully.

"You tryin' to run away from me or somethin'?" Seifer asked unnecessarily.

"I'm getting my gym bag."

"Yeah, but that's no reason to take off in a full blown _sprint_," the blond chided. "See, I'm still exhausted from tryin' to catch up with ya! Keep fucking around like this and I'll have a fuckin' heart attack and _you'll_ be the one having to do CPR."

"Not in this lifetime, perv."

"What? You wouldn't do CPR on me? So you'd just let sweet little adorable me die a long, slow, agonizing _death_?"

The brunette bared his teeth and hissed, "No, if you keep pestering me I'll get a gun and ease your parting."

Clutching his heart, Seifer heaved a mock sob and threw himself halfway on Squall's shoulder, who gasped and almost buckled beneath the weight.

"_Man_, you are _heartless_!" the blond wept theatrically, though his fiendish grin gave him away. Squall, groaning laboriously, tried and failed to shove Seifer away and into a random group of students that they passed in the hallway. Forced to wobble along and ignore the curious looks that they received, the brunette was relieved when they reached the door and Seifer graciously removed himself from his shoulder.

"Quit hangin' all over me," Squall snarled as he slammed one of the door panels open and strode off towards the parking lot. "You pest."

"Why?"

"Everyone's staring at us like this is a goddamn _freak show_!"

"So? Let 'em stare their fuckin' eyeballs out. I don't give a shit."

While they were walking down the winding concrete path, Seifer realized that he was at least faintly surprised over his own foolhardy attitude and flirty behavior that, in due time, was calculated to start the wheels of the rumor mill. At his old school, he had harbored no interest in engaging in any kind of PDA with his lovers, whether they were male, female or anything in between. Physical contact that _didn't _involve him getting his rocks off had always been more of a chore, anyway; unless it was for the sake of a good bump and grind, he had never been the touchy-feely type of guy who always needed to grope and kiss his significant other.

Then again, when had his "others" ever been "_significant_" in the first place?

Looking to his right at Squall's perfect profile silhouetted against the cloud-dusted sky, it was suddenly clear to him that his view on relationships had changed - at least with this guy, anyway. Seifer couldn't suppress those strong surges of affection that came over him whenever he thought of the brunette or looked at him like he was doing just now - moreover, he really didn't _want_ to suppress them. He wanted to kiss Squall, taste him, feel him, hold him close... grab him and fuck his sanity into sweet oblivion. Yeah, alright - that particular urge was there and as strong as it always had been. Still, this was no longer merely about satisfying that primal instinct of his; for the first time, the blond felt like he would break apart if Squall was suddenly erased from his life - if he couldn't see him, talk to him or touch him anymore.

Perhaps 'Irvine the Babe-Slayer' had been right in one aspect - things didn't really get exciting in the romance department until there was a true challenge involved, and Squall was a _challenge_ if Seifer had ever seen one.

"How long are you working today?" he asked, giving the subject of his musings a cute smile when the brunette turned to him as they were walking.

"Until six."

"Mind if I stop by?"

Squall's stride slowed at that question and he lowered his head in uncertainty, before refocusing his view on his bike that was somewhere straight ahead of them. So _this_ was why Seifer had asked about his work schedule earlier this morning... Because he wanted to come by to see him? Somehow, that thought hadn't even occurred to him before. It was strange that the blond would ask his permission, since he usually seemed to do whatever he pleased _without _bothering with anyone else's feelings.

"You don't want to see me, eh?" Seifer sighed, feigning hurt. "That's cool. I understand."

"No, that's... not really it..."

Despite his earlier annoyance over the blond's immature behavior, Squall still couldn't deny that he was smitten by the way Seifer seemed to care for him so genuinely. Typically, the eighteen year old jock acted the part of an arrogant asshole, but he certainly had his sweet moments - especially when he was alone with Squall.

"So you don't mind?" the blond gently probed further.

"I don't care..." Squall grunted, his forcibly frigid tone not entirely convincing. "Do whatever you want."

Seifer smiled unconsciously at that reply. In the course of the past week, he had learned that Squall would never _explicitly_ agree to anything - thus, the fact that he didn't _disagree_ with the idea of the blond visiting him at work was as much consent as the emerald-eyed youth would realistically be able to coax out of him.

In any case, he was satisfied.

They halted once they had reached Squall's bike and the brunette retrieved his gym bag, which he had strapped to the back of his seat. Seifer wondered momentarily whether his younger friend wasn't worried about anyone stealing his belongings - but then again, his own workout stuff was laying on the flat bed of his truck, easily accessible by anyone. Frankly, Seifer didn't care whether his gym clothes would get nicked or not; he happily welcomed any excuse to buy new outfits, if only because he'd gotten bored with his old ones.

"You can put your stuff in my truck, if you want," he suggested when he noticed that Squall was going to lug around both his heavy book bag and the workout attire he had just picked up. "I mean, I'm guessing you don't wanna leave all your books out here, right? That's just _asking_ for trouble."

As expected, the brunette shook his head.

"I'm fine."

"Your shit looks heavy."

"I can handle it," Squall snorted back, his voice edged with irritation.

"Why 'handle it' when you can leave it to me, princess? You just _love_ makin' it hard on yourself, don't ya?"

The dark haired boy opened his mouth to hiss another snappy remark, but a sudden jab of pain in his left shoulder caused him to change his mind and remain silent. Admittedly, the weight of both of his bags combined was a bit too much for his sore joint, which was protesting vehemently. Perhaps he _should_ leave his books in Seifer's truck, but...

Sighing, he sucked his bottom lip between the front row of his teeth and started chewing, trying to relieve his anxiety with that near painful oral fixation. He knew well enough why it was so difficult for him to accept the blond's help, even regarding something as trivial as this, but he certainly _didn't_ know what to do about it. Squall didn't want to seem any weaker or more vulnerable than he already did, especially around Seifer; the blond always acted so fucking _dominant_ and in control, as if he was used to getting exactly what he wanted. Seifer was hard to resist and even harder to push away, and every girl in their class seemed to be fucking _crazy_ about his stupid jock ass.

'_I wonder who he's going to take to that fucking dance. I'm surprised none of the girls has asked him yet. They don't usually waste **this** much time...'_

"You look like you took a square bite out of a lemon," the subject of Squall's reflections suddenly chuckled. "What're you thinking about, huh?"

Cringing, Squall met the blond's brilliantly green gaze, which was sparking with amusement. For a second, the brunette was seriously worried that Seifer could read his thoughts, before he recalled that this was absolutely impossible. Switching his gym bag from his left hand into his right, he fought down the blush that threatened to tinge his cheeks and regarded Seifer with a cutting gaze.

"None of your business," he clipped defensively. "Where's your stupid truck?"

Squall tried to deny the fact that he had repeatedly pondered the Homecoming Dance and whom Seifer was going to take along as his date. It was fucking _embarrassing_. These kinds of thoughts were entirely inappropriate for a guy. Yeah, so he liked Seifer a tiny, _miniscule_ little bit - what of it? They weren't _dating _or something ludicrous like that so what did it matter what Seifer did, and with whom? The last thing Squall needed in his life was a fucking boyfriend, and besides, he wasn't gay or anything to begin with.

And yet... when Seifer led the way to his vehicle, Squall didn't once question why he willingly tagged along and kept closer to the blond than he ever did to anyone. It seemed natural all in itself; something he had never learned but _knew_ how to do. Although he still didn't _trust _Seifer, precisely, he was beyond the point where he sensed danger and betrayal behind everything the blond said or did. For now, Squall was willing to go with the flow and let himself drift a little ways into the unknown, even if he'd never be able to fully ignore the fear that constantly lurked in the back of his mind.

'_Why does this shit have to be so **complicated**...? I don't get it at all! I don't like him, but at the same time, I do. What's **wrong **with me?'_

Pushing back that question, which had pretty much been eating away at him ever since he had met the interesting blond teen, he watched how Seifer retrieved his gym bag from the flat bed of his flame red truck. The teenager then proceeded to unlock his driver door and turned around to perform a demanding hand gesture in Squall's direction.

"Your bag," the eighteen year old ordered curtly, causing a disgruntled Squall to thrust the heavy backpack and attached motorcycle helmet into his arms, which instantly knocked the wind out of Seifer. "Ow! Hey, the fuck's in here, a _dead_ _body_? Thanks for almost ripping my arm off there, jeez."

"Anytime," Squall replied with a small, feral grin as he coolly smoothed his hair out of his eyes.

Chuckling despite his bruised ribcage, Seifer stuffed both of their bags into his vehicle and locked it once more. For some reason, this whole incident reminded him of one time in middle school when a girl he had been "dating" had asked him to carry her heavy books for her and he had straight out laughed in her face for it. Needless to say, their little "relationship" hadn't lasted very long and the heartbroken girl had only spoken to him again to call him a "rude, heartless baboon".

'_... I wonder what's different from back then. The fact that Squall would never **ask** me to carry his books for him or the fact that I'd **willingly** do it anyway? ... Both, I guess. Everything's as different with him as it possibly ever could be with anyone. Not that I'm complaining...'_

Scratching his neck with four long fingers, Seifer lazily approached his companion, who had returned to the sidewalk and was waiting for him with a bored frown on his pretty features. The sardonic grimace could have fooled many into believing that Squall was either feeling very annoyed or very angry, but Seifer wasn't so easily tricked; in reality, his dark haired friend wasn't any good at pretending to be in a bad mood when he actually _wasn't_.

"All set?" the blond asked while angling himself down to Squall just barely as he stepped upon the elevated sidewalk.

The younger boy nodded an affirmative and scooted two steps out of the way, apparently worried that Seifer might kiss him or do something similarly embarrassing. The blond, however, did nothing of the like as he set off towards the school building once more, although Squall, who was walking next to him, would have been in perfect reach of his hands and lips had he done so much as tried.

'_If it wasn't for all these losers flatdicking around the parking lot... and those big ass classroom windows over there... then I might just have gone for it. He's lookin' kinda willing, if I might say so myself. He just can't resist the Almasy dong. Why, no one can! Haha! Hum... you know what...'_

"... I'm hungry."

Squall rolled his eyes at the unexpected remark and watched how Seifer was patting his belly rather sadly. Judging by the blond's size, he probably worked out at the gym quite often and required appropriate amounts of nourishment, but his whiny tone was just downright pathetic.

"It's almost lunchtime," the younger grumbled as they filed into the building and made their way to the locker rooms.

"I'll be _starved_ by then," Seifer replied, his typically growling voice ascending new levels of misery.

"Whatever."

"Seriously, Squall, I'm hungrier than a fat bitch in a buffet line!"

The pale boy shot Seifer a look of pure disgust out of steel grey eyes, seeming rather appalled by the blond's colorful metaphor. Seifer, who had noticed this, grinned down at him.

"What?" he asked smugly. "Never heard that one before?"

"No," Squall replied with a cold sneer raking over his lips as he adjusted the position of his gym bag on his right shoulder. "Must be jock speak."

"What's _that _supposed to mean?"

"Figure it out for yourself."

"No, seriously, tell me," Seifer implored insistently. "I wanna know."

The brunette sighed wearily in response, before he clutched his arms in front of his chest and drew his brows together.

"I'm not like you or your jock friends," he pressed. "_That's_ what it means."

"So? I don't want you to be like them, Squall. Besides, it doesn't matter if you're _like_ me, as long as you _like_ me, right?"

The weird candor of that comment drove Squall's poor head to spin. He most certainly _wasn't_ the same type of person as Seifer, but perhaps that truly wasn't that important; their differences pretty much seemed to define their relationship and it actually wasn't all that bad. Realistically, Squall was never going to find someone precisely akin to himself, but that had never been his desire in the first place, anyway. For all his annoying cockiness, impertinent demeanor and klutzy charm, Seifer actually _was _quite likable.

"I'm right, ain't I?" Seifer drawled impishly.

"You're a fucking idiot."

Seifer snickered at the catty retort, but refrained from saying anything further and, consequently, digging his hole any deeper. Squall was so hauntingly beautiful even when he was being a cranky, PMSing bitch - or pretending to be one, for that matter - that his hotness factor had Seifer's insolence rather quenched. The morning had progressed surprisingly well, thus far, and the blond wasn't about to push his luck. In return for Squall's company on his little trip to Alclad – and others that were hopefully to follow – Seifer was in fact _perfectly_ willing to behave himself.

... Sort of, anyway.

That morning had marked the one week anniversary of their acquaintanceship, which couldn't be defined any more clearly than that by either one of them. Some outsiders might have regarded them as friends, particularly on this day when they almost seemed inseparable, but Seifer would never be satisfied with such a mere platonic relationship between them - and frankly, neither would Squall.

This wasn't their first meeting, but this day felt like the beginning of something significant that neither of the boys could quite describe or explain, but that they _wanted_ all the same. They would attempt to forget the ways in which they had hurt each other, and instead they would focus on the feelings buried deep within their hearts that had once been shut down for very different reasons. Seifer had never known love - he'd never even scratched the surface - and Squall was slowly forgetting how to live, but perhaps together, they would be able to find what they had both been scared to look for.

Whether they would succeed or not, only time could truly tell, but this was all they could do in order to wipe the slate clean and free themselves from the shackles of a dark future that, one week ago, had seemed all but inevitable.

* * *

Alrighty, site's back up! I'd been meaning to post this chapter earlier today, but that didn't happen. Oh well. It took over a month so a few hours don't matter much I suppose :) It's still in time for the new year, woohoo!

That said,

**!.! HAPPY 2006 EVERYONE !.!**

Don't celebrate too hard ;D I hope your new year will be fun, happy and filled with lots of pretty gay men XD Manlove, wee XD

_Edit_: In case you didn't know, "Tabula Rasa" means "a need or an opportunity to start from the beginning."

I'm sorry if the story development seems slow to some or if Seifer seems too ignorant towards Squall's problems. Personally, having seen people act in similar ways as our favorite blond gunblader, I think it's more realistic like this. Think about it this way... if issues like Squall's were so easily detected (only a WEEK has passed so far, mind, and the two hardly even know each other), do you think there'd be as many teens cutting themselves, being raped or commiting suicide? I wish it was as easy as 1-2-3, but I daresay that it's not. If you know what's going on, it's easy enough to detect the signs, but if you don't... well, it just ain't that simple.

As for character development, I like to take my time. Realistically, the two have moved much faster than anyone in real life would, so I try to compensate for that by doing things in more detail. I don't think I could have skipped any of these past chapters and I'm not planning on skipping any in the future to get to the "good stuff." Sorry... I know I can be a slowpoke :)


	19. Snow Angel

-:-**  
Chapter 19  
Snow Angel  
**  
"_Fuck snow."_  
-:-

This Chapter is Dedicated to:

Virulent Enmity - For being my amazing beta and giving me that "nudge" whenever I really need it

Mai Lynn - For feeding my muses by introducing me to RP and always cheering me up so sweetly

-:-

_Snow..._

_I remember now._

_... Not that I ever truly forgot._

_It was snowing that day, too - on that freezing winter evening when she first stayed at the hospital all those years ago. Ell almost died in her arms that night, and although it was all my fault and I would've given **anything** to save her, there was nothing I could do. Nothing whatsoever. Not a goddamned thing._

_I felt so... useless._

_I think that was the only night I truly thought about killing myself._

_I was fourteen._

_I didn't understand it back then... why things happened the way they did. Why she slept away from home for so long, watching over Ell's recovery, and why **he** spent those nights in my bed._

_I didn't understand why he touched me in places that Mom never had and why he looked at me with a darkness in his eyes that I'd never seen there before. I loved him like a father and he scared me so fucking much._

_I didn't understand his reasons, but I pretended that they weren't sick, or twisted, or cruel. I was so blinded by my guilt that I honestly thought it was alright – that I **deserved** all the pain he put me through. Really, I thought that he only wanted me to fill Mom's place for a little while, and that everything would eventually go back to the way it always had been._

_... I suppose I never understood much of anything._

_How long has it been since that day? How many years? How many nights? I don't even know. Everything just kind of slipped out of place. All I remember now is staring at my bedroom window that very first time, trying to find the snowflakes that were clinging to the frosted glass. I watched them forming those weird, crystallized webs of ice in the darkness, and I ignored his breath that ran down my throat like the edge of a knife, whispering curses and threats that became meaningless a long time ago._

_I **hate** snow._

_Not because it's cold or wet or anything like that... but because so many things started that night, and so many ended._

_She always wondered..._

_Why I stopped making snow angels._

_.  
._

"Jeez, I swear, one of these days you'll run face first into a fuckin' light post or somethin'. I just hope I'll be there to see it and take the picture. Wouldn't that be a fuckin' Kodak moment, huh?"

"... What?"

As the imaginary world inside Squall's head dulled and faded quietly into the background, reality came surging back to him and reclaimed center stage. Actually, 'reality' happened to be blond haired, green eyed, well over six feet tall and clad in a squeaky yellow sweater that was literally _crying_ for attention; Seifer Almasy was in fact quite difficult to overlook, but his brunette companion miraculously accomplished the task quite effortlessly. Squall couldn't even say what exactly had triggered the flashbacks that had manifested in his mind, but when those memories had surfaced, the school and students around him had become entirely insignificant.

Obviously, he had involuntarily tuned out Seifer's presence, too.

"Oi, did you even hear what I said? Huh?"

They were walking down the hallway towards the locker rooms, avoiding clusters of other teens as they passed, but Squall couldn't possibly recall what exactly had caused him to space off shortly after they'd dropped their bags off at Seifer's truck and entered the school building, nor did he remember what the blond had been talking about back then. Seifer was studying him interestedly from the side now, a suspicious flicker in his eyes.

Feeling like he was put on display, Squall shrugged defensively.

"No. I didn't."

"... Figures."

Seifer's cynical tone irritated Squall. Being in the relentless presence of the pushy blond teen was difficult, to say the least; Squall's attention span was naturally short, and he felt smothered when other people were constantly hanging on his sleeve, demanding his undivided interest. Still, the brunette's pride and silent affection for Seifer didn't permit him to buckle under his annoyance and tell the blond to just get the fuck lost. He'd try this, at least for a while, and he was quite glad that the void in his mind was filled with Seifer's blabbering instead of the usual demons and darkness.

"What _did_ you say, then?" Squall finally asked, his tone audibly strained.

"I said that I want it to fuckin' snow already," Seifer explained, jabbing his hands into the front pouch of his hoodie and letting out a longing sigh.

"Oh..."

'_Snow, huh? Right, I think I remember him saying it now. That explains where those memories suddenly came from, I guess... But why—'_

"... Why the hell do you want it to snow?" Squall finished that question out loud, his eyebrows mashed together.

"'Cause I wanna go snowboarding," the blond continued excitedly. "It's fuckin' _sweet_, I tell ya! I've been snowboarding since I was eight. Hey, here's an idea: I'll take you! It'll be fun!"

"It's only September, in case you didn't notice," Squall quipped dryly. "There won't _be_ any snow for a while."

"_End_ of September, cupcake. Besides, I heard that it starts snowing here around October, because of the extreme altitude and shit. That true, or what?"

Squall shrugged unwillingly in response and turned his head to concentrate on the shock-white brick wall as they were walking. Ever since that dark night of three years ago, he hadn't been too fond of winter, or snow in particular. Therefore, he naturally harbored no desire whatsoever to discuss the subject any further, much less with Seifer of all people. What was the idiot complaining about, anyway? He was running around in shorts almost every day and, almost like a cat, he happily soaked up every patch of sunshine he could find – winter would quickly put an end to that.

'_Why does he like winter, anyway? It doesn't really seem like him, somehow. I mean, winter here is so fucking cold and nasty, and Seifer's always warm and tan and he kind of... smells like summer.'_

Cringing in disgust, Squall ground his teeth together and quickly shoved that embarrassing allegory aside. Seifer was like summer? Oh, fucking Christ.

'_Great, here I am thinking he smells like fuckin' flowers and shit... I must be losing my fucking mind. Goddamn him. I don't even **like** summer, so why am I comparing the two? Wait, what am I saying here, anyway...?'_

Truthfully, Seifer _was _a lot like the hottest season of the year; he smelled kind of like summer rain, his hair was naturally blond and his body was always so warm and perfectly tanned. It wasn't too difficult to picture him hitting the slopes of Alclad on a snowboard, either, but Squall still believed that Seifer was more like the type of guy hanging in Speedos at a sandy stretch of beach with a flock of girls in scanty bikinis rubbing tanning oil on his chest.

Tanning oil...? _Speedos_...?

'_Fucking piece of shit brain! If you don't keep together, I'll get a goddamn ice pick and shut you up for fucking good! Jeez. I bet he was probably born in summer or something of that sort. That must be why he's... why he's the way he is. Yeah, that's gotta be it.'_

"When were you born?" Squall blurted out defiantly. "Summer, right?"

"Huh? Me?" Seifer asked dumbstruck, scratching his head. "Uh, no. My birthday's December 22nd. Why are you asking? What about you?"

'_What the hell? **December **22nd? That can't be right. That's not summer, that's more like Christmas... imagine: Seifer, the fat fucking Santa... funny, but it doesn't make any sense...'_

"Squall?"

"... What?" the brunette snapped, stirred from his musings against his will.

"When's your birthday?"

"Huh? Oh. The 23rd of August..."

'_I don't get it. December? What the fuck... I could've sworn...'_

"You were born in summer, hm?" Seifer snickered artfully. "Yeah, I had ya pegged as a summer baby."

"What? Why?"

The blond grinned. "Why, because of your bright sparkling personality, of course."

"Drop the fuck dead."

"Aww," Seifer cooed tauntingly as they rounded the corner into the last hallway that led to the boys' locker room. "And you're seventeen, right? Jeez, aren't you quite the youngin'? I'm already turning nineteen this year."

"Seriously...?" Squall said, looking puzzled. "Did you repeat a year, or what?"

"Yup, I sure did. Ninth grade. The whole home-schooling thing didn't quite work out as my parents had planned," the blond declared with a lofty smirk, before his eyes suddenly narrowed and he sneered mischievously. "Sooo... seventeen, eh? My, my. That means it'll be, like, a whole _year_ before you'll be legal, jail bait. Oh, just how _am_ I going to control myself, pray tell?"

Squall frowned at the naughty cackle that followed the blond's suggestive remark, but he resisted the desire to flip Seifer the bird in the middle of school.

"Shut up, moron," he snarled instead, looking as unimpressed as ever.

Deep inside, however, Seifer's words had stirred even more uncomfortable memories from the dark, reclusive corner of Squall's mind in which the brunette generally tucked away every painful thought and feeling that his brain had determined he simply couldn't handle for the time being.

'_Not legal...? Back then... I was only...'_

Even in brightest daylight and in Seifer's typically distracting presence, it was frightening to relive what had been done to him for so many long, terrible years. Clasping his hands to fists by his sides, Squall tried to deny the sickness that was persistently clawing at his insides. It had been a few days since his stepfather's last assault upon his body, but the memory would always stay with him, as would that man's unbearable stench that was a nauseating blend of cold, stale cigar smoke and some ridiculously expensive aftershave.

Clenching his eyes shut, Squall shook his head and brought his right hand to his temple.

'_Stop it. Just stop... I don't want to deal with this right now...'_

Squall didn't understand why these uncomfortable memories kept crashing into his mind today; he didn't usually have _this_ much trouble repressing the flashbacks of his stepfather's abuse. Whenever he _did_, the delicate caress of his oh-so-handy cutter usually provided distraction enough and granted him a few precious minutes of dullness that allowed him to cling on to the brink of sanity. When he forced his skin to bleed, his consciousness just slipped off to a happier place, a happier _time_, and the throbbing in his heart was replaced by the fire etched into his raw wrists; it was a cheap replacement, perhaps, but one far easier to endure.

Nevertheless, there was still one thing that didn't fully make sense to Squall: even though he was capable of experiencing such a broad spectrum of pain and suffering, why did he always feel so _numb_ inside at the same time? Like he didn't care about anything... like he had been hurting for so long that his feelings had been blunted forever and nothing really mattered anymore, or ever _would _again. Every time he picked up that blade, he had to cut himself a little deeper and allowed himself to bleed a little longer, only to feel that same kind of relief.

Cutting his skin was like a drug that was slowly losing its effect, and Squall gradually had to keep upping the dose.

"Hey. You look pale," a quiet voice on his right suddenly noted. "What's wrong? Why are you holding your head like that?"

He glanced through his fanned-out fingers that were still resting against his temple. He hadn't stopped walking, but his pace had slowed sufficiently to alert the blond by his side. Seifer was watching him intently out of hawk-like green eyes, no longer grinning or chattering about stupid things.

Gulping, Squall had to realize that he had been mistaken about one single thing:

There _was _something that mattered, after all, and that 'something' was standing right in front of him.

"It's nothing," he replied, dropping his hand immediately and swallowing the pain raging inside his head.

"It's never _'nothing'_," Seifer answered, the irritation in his voice catching Squall off his guard. "Stop bullshitting me, for fuck's sake!"

They had halted in front of the locker room door and were looking at each other in irresolute silence. The determination scorching across Seifer's eyes like a desert storm made Squall uncomfortable, but he managed to lift his lips into a small, forced smile and murmured, "I'm not bullshitting you. I'm fine. It's just a headache. No big deal, alright?"

Saying nothing further, Squall stemmed his palm against the door and pushed it open. He steadied it just long enough for Seifer to follow him through the entryway, before he released it and allowed it to fall shut once more.

Without paying attention to the other students that were either getting dressed or just palling around with their buddies, Squall proceeded to the very back of the tiled room that reeked of sweat and dirty socks that were in dire need of a wash cycle or two. The brunette had his own secluded corner in the changing room where nobody usually bothered him – although judging by the sound of Seifer's footsteps closely behind him, Squall could tell that this was about to change.

'_... Fuck.'_

He didn't really mind having Seifer around, but the thought of getting _undressed_ in front of the blond still caused Squall a considerable amount of distress. Biting his lip in search of some kind of distraction, he pushed a few stray fringes of hair out of his eyes and approached a random, faraway locker. Still keeping his head low, he slowly dropped his gym bag on the bench before him, took a deep breath and threw a subtle glance over his shoulder.

"Uhm..."

Cringing, he realized that Seifer was towering merely an inch behind him, looking goddamn huge and intimidating. The blond's green eyes were piercing right through Squall's, although their expression was strangely blank and eerie. The brunette didn't particularly like that awkward look on Seifer's face, thus he scrunched up his nose and crossed his arms before his chest as if to look intimidating.

"What?" he grimaced, knitting his brows together. "What's up? Hey! Snap out of it, alright?"

Seifer didn't react to his irritable tone, and just as Squall was debating to punch some sense into his opposite, the blond's gaze snapped back into focus and he silently scooted off to the side. There, he plopped down in front of a locker that was very close to the brunette's, yet not quite close enough to seem intruding.

'_... Hn.'_

Seifer was already bending over and undoing his shoelaces when Squall still stood in the same place, watching the blond out of attentive grey eyes. When the older boy had stared at him only seconds before, Squall had noticed something in those emerald orbs that had seemed oddly out of place in the suffocating warmth and buzzing noise of the locker room. It had only been a brief, unsteady flicker of emotion, perhaps, but it had looked powerful and repressed; a strange, unspoken feeling that Seifer seemed to be trying to bury. Squall couldn't decide whether it had looked like desire, suspicion, or a little bit of both.

'_What is he thinking about, I wonder... ? I guess I never really asked myself that. Well, he doesn't exactly **look** like he does a whole lot of thinking. Then again...'_

Overcome by a sudden sensation of discomfort, Squall found himself wondering whether he had, just maybe, underestimated Seifer and his overall cognitive abilities. Realistically, the blond could be neither as shallow nor as thick as he always pretended to be, or he would never have gotten as close to Squall as he had.

'_... Whatever. I'm giving him too much credit here. I'm sure it was nothing.'_

Of course, Seifer had been right – it was never 'nothing', and Squall would've done well remembering that. Unfortunately, downplaying Seifer's intellect or his feelings for him was far too easy of an escape for Squall to pass up. He wasn't going to deal with issues whose existence he could still ignore. Thus, he simply shrugged off his curiosity, turned towards his locker and whisked through his bag to produce a pair of shorts, a long t-shirt and his running shoes.

'_I hope this gym class won't be a total disaster like the last one. Jeff's a stupid son of a bitch. It's not **my** fucking fault that Kato... ugh. Whatever. I'm tired of thinking about it.'_

Sitting down, the brunette peeled himself out of his leather jacket and pulled his black wool sweater over his head, causing his hair to stick up in all sorts of funky angles. Squall patted the rogue strands back into place with an irritable snort, when he suddenly noticed Seifer's eyes on him again.

With his hands still pressed against his head, Squall now didn't have to guess twice what Seifer's intensive gaze was focused on. Frowning, he saw the blond's eyes wandering back and forth between his bared torso, bruised arms and the tight, black fabric dressings around his mutilated wrists. Squall had opted to omit his leather bands today and strapped on some fashionable bandages for simplicity's and comfort's sake; after all, they were much easier to wear beneath his long, narrow shirt sleeves. He'd put some white athlete's tape over them before heading outside, though, just to be less conspicuous.

"Squall..."

Seifer's voice caught him by surprise. It sounded unsure, scared, and it was shadowed with a subtle, but desperate plea. Now holding his gym shirt before his chest in a feeble attempt of covering up, Squall reciprocated Seifer's forceful stare with an air of confusion.

"What?" he asked vacantly. "What do you want?"

The blond creased his brows heavily, and for some reason, Squall suddenly knew exactly what Seifer wanted to say.

_..: "Stop hurting yourself." :.._

After a moment of hesitation, Squall slipped into his white, long-sleeved t-shirt and shook his disheveled hair out of his face once more. When he looked to the side, Seifer was still watching him with that same grim expression from his seated position on the other bench, only half dressed in red shorts and expensive looking sneakers. Squall swiped a quick glimpse across the blond's naked chest, blinking coyly; then, his eyes involuntarily roved along Seifer's collarbone and to his arms, where they carefully studied the fine black lines of the blond's tattoo and the taut muscles moving beneath.

'_Shit... he's hot.'_

Again, Squall wished for some brilliant solution to keep his thoughts from wandering off on their own, but short from scrambling his own brain with a blender, he didn't really know how to go about it.

'_He's gonna drive me in-fucking-**sane**. Hell, at this point, I'm probably already as loopy as they come. ... Fuck, am I **still **looking at him?'_

Hastily, he returned his focus to Seifer's face and pretended that he hadn't been staring at the blond's perfectly sculptured upper body. If Seifer had noticed his quirky look-over, he did a good job at hiding it, because he was still frowning ever so subtly. Then again, perhaps he was just used to the stares.

'_Why isn't he saying anything? He's just looking at me all funny. Come to think of it, he's been acting strange the whole day. Like, that kiss in the bathroom... he was being all nice and shit. He's never kissed me like that before. Does that have anything to do with what he said about falling in lo—'_

"... Alright, cut that staring crap. You're giving me the creeps!"

There was a spark of pride flaring in Squall's chest as he spat those words – pride over the fact that he had kept himself from finishing the silly contemplation of Seifer honestly being in love with him. It really wasn't such an uncomfortable thought in itself, really, but like hell was he actually going to admit that to anyone.

'_I don't care if he's in love with me, I don't care if he's in love with me, I don't care if he's in love with me, I don't c—'_

"Maybe _you're_ giving me the creeps, too," Seifer replied slowly, causing Squall's silly train of thought to derail. "Ever thought of that?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" the brunette huffed irritably.

Again, the blond cast a pregnant look at Squall's wrists, before sneering very softly.

"Take a wild guess," he whispered suggestively and pulled his black dry-fit t-shirt over his head, severing his and Squall's eye contact.

That vague answer had Squall stumped. He could see what Seifer was hinting at, of course, but he couldn't really understand why the blond was suddenly so fixated on the issue of his cut up wrists. It was something Squall had done for years; at this point, his scars were simply a part of his identity and they defined him in many strange, painful ways. Sure, Squall didn't consider cutting his own body with a knife "normal," per se, but it was nothing for Seifer to be worried about. First of all, his wounds were none of the blond's concern to begin with, and secondly, it wasn't like he was honestly trying to _kill_ himself or anything of that sort.

'_I kinda thought he had understood that much... Great. I guess not. How lame. If I wanted to kill myself, I would've done it a **long** time ago.'_

With a grim smile, Squall kicked off his boots and stood up to unbutton his jeans. For some reason, his cheeks felt a bit flush as he turned and pulled down his pants. He was wearing black boxer shorts as he always did, and Seifer didn't even seem to be eyeballing him or anything, but he still felt vulnerable taking off his clothes in front of anyone. Quickly, he put on his shorts and sat back down in order to step into his running shoes, all the while consciously avoiding eye contact with his blond bench neighbor.

After he had finished his changing ritual, Squall produced a steadily thinning roll of white medical tape from his gym bag. He twirled it in his fingers for a moment, making a mental note to himself to buy a new roll from the drugstore after work, when someone suddenly snatched the tape from his hand.

'_What the—'_

Snapping his head up, he glared daggers and scalpels at Seifer, who had skidded across the bench and was now sitting next to him with the roll of tape resting in his open palm. The blond wasn't smirking like Squall had expected he would, but was instead reciprocating the brunette's icy gaze with a cool, serious look of his own.

"I'll do it."

Without awaiting Squall's reaction, Seifer grabbed the dark haired boy's left forearm and pulled it towards himself. Then, he pressed the loose end of the sticky tape against the black bandage that already covered his friend's skin. His air was professional and sober as he steadied Squall's arm in the air and wound the tape around his wrist. Although he actually wanted to flip out and give Squall a piece of his pissed off mind, he forced himself not to; there was still a slim chance that the brunette honestly had no fucking clue that he was worrying the crap out of him. Eventually, Seifer would make sure to rectify that, but the boys' locker room probably _wasn't_ the location to be holding passionate speeches about exactly how much Squall was scaring him.

'_I'll talk to him about this whole cutting thing again on Friday, when we're alone. I wanna know exactly why the fuck he does this, and what for. I won't have anymore of this 'none-of-your-business' **bullshit**. He can try that shit on someone else, but it ain't workin' on me!'_

"Quit babying me, moron," Squall finally growled meekly, keeping his voice low so that it wouldn't travel across the rows of lockers to any of the other boys who might still be in the room.

Seifer severed the tape with his teeth, grinning lazily as it tore. As he was finished tending to Squall's left wrist, he continued with the brunette's other limb, ignoring the fact that the dark haired boy let out a sound of frustration.

"If you _act_ like a baby, expect to be _treated_ like one," the blond eventually replied in an equally hushed tone. "'Sides, I think a bit of babying is just what you need."

"The fuck are you saying?"

"I'm saying that there's not a damn thing wrong with letting others treat you nicely every now and then. Seriously, doesn't the martyr role get old?"

"Fuck off."

Groaning a sigh, Seifer shook his head.

"Hopeless."

He snipped the tape with his teeth once more, making a face at the gummy taste of glue on his tongue. He didn't bother to examine his workmanship, but instead tossed the shrunken roll of tape into Squall's lap and stood up.

"You ready?" he asked coolly, sizing his companion up.

After a moment of silence, Squall stashed the tape in his bag and mumbled, "Yeah."

He flexed his hands a few times, relieved that Seifer hadn't wrapped his wounds too tightly. When he shot a glimpse upwards, he noticed that Seifer was watching him as eerily as ever. Frankly, the blond possessed eyes so intense that their gaze could make the whole world _tilt_, but Squall was trying to ignore that aspect about the blond. Therefore, he stood edgily and shoved his belongings into an open locker. Squall slammed it shut and proudly crossed his arms, looking defiant from behind chocolate brown fringes of hair... ready to take on the fucking _universe_.

Seifer merely chuckled.

'_Grumpy bitch or not, he's got spirit. Gotta give him that.'_

Squall walked past him through the room, and Seifer followed willingly. They wove their way out the door and out the school building, sighing in mute appreciation when the warm rays of sunlight hit their necks and caressed their skin.

"It's a nice day," Seifer remarked as he craned his head towards the sky.

"Yeah."

"The weather should be good on Friday, too."

"... I guess. Whatever."

They were walking next to each other up a sloped, grassy hill to the track and football field. Seifer squinted his eyes to narrow slits of bright emerald, before he grunted, "Don't forget, cupcake – you promised you'd come to Alclad with me."

"I didn't _'promise'_ anything," Squall bit in return.

"Well, _fuck me_, your highness. Personally, I think you owe me a date."

"I owe you _nothing_!" the brunette shot back icily.

"Alright, fine. Just tell me if you're coming then, or if I need to convince you a bit more."

"I said I'd go, didn't I?" the brunette growled, his voice now etched with irritation.

"Just makin' sure," Seifer shrugged. "I really want you to come, you know. So don't stand me up."

Squall bit the inside of his cheek to prevent himself from gulping loudly at the husky undertone embedded in Seifer's deliberately sweet words that, for once, were completely free of mock. It was almost obscene how much Seifer seemed to _enjoy_ his company, and frankly, Squall found it pretty fucking paradox. How could Seifer really enjoy being around someone like him? All the things Seifer had said about liking him just didn't make any sense. Yes, they _sounded_ nice and stroked Squall's battered, bruised ego, but they were absurd, all the same.

'_That's right, it's absurd. Totally, **entirely** absurd. I wonder if someone dropped him on his head as a baby, 'cause none of what he says or does makes **any** fucking sense…'_

"You're cute when you're all pouty."

Snarling, Squall snapped his head towards Seifer and growled, "I'm _not_ pouty, alright! And I sure as fuck am not _'cute'_, either!"

"Hah."

"Don't _'hah'_ me, jackass!"

"Aww. The more you deny it, the cuter you are, cupcake."

"Shut up! Do you _want_ to die today? I'll kick your fucking a—"

"Well, well, glad to see you gentlemen finally made it here. I was about to start without you."

With a startled flinch, Squall realized that they had already reached the huddle of other students and their cynical teacher, Kiros Seagul. It was really quite unnerving how Seifer could make him forget about everything around him. One of these days, he probably _would_ run straight into a light post.

"What are we doing?" Seifer asked Kiros, tapping the front of his running shoes on the turf out of habit. Looking around, the blond caught sight of Jeff and his cronies standing a little ways to the side of the group, talking amongst each other.

"Interesting question, Mister Almasy," Kiros replied, his dark lips twitching in the semblance of a smile. "Why, I think we'll start out with five laps today and then we'll take it from there, hm?"

The collective groan that heaved through the air only caused the seemingly malicious teacher's spirits to rise. Smirking now, he pointed down the curve of the track and said, "Don't let me keep you, gentlemen. Give it your best."

'_Our best, huh?' _Seifer thought, looking over at Squall who was watching him from the corner of his slate blue eyes. _'Hm. Sure, why the hell not?'_

"Hey, Squall," he called out to the brunette. "I'll race ya!"

"What?"

"I said, I'll race ya. Come on! Loser buys lunch!"

"No thanks," Squall snorted indignantly, turning away.

"... So, you're a chicken."

"Whatever."

"Ah well, you were going to lose anyway. Can't blame ya for wanting to avoid humiliation."

"Asshole, I..."

The dark haired boy paused and frowned hesitantly; he had to admit, Seifer's taunting words had sparked his very masculine and _competitive_ edge. If the cocky blond really thought he could race him and win, he was in for a surprise.

"Fine," he finally murmured, his eyes glinting dangerously as he bent into a ready position. "Have it your way, then."

"Thatta boy!" Seifer snickered, angling his body into a similar pose. "Ready? Alright. 1... 2... 3... GO!"

With an arched brow and a surprised whistle on his lips, Kiros watched the two boys take off down the track in a full blown sprint. His other students were jogging along at a rather mellow pace, preserving their energy for the rest of their run. They, too, started and jumped out of the way as Seifer and Squall hurled themselves past them, their faces fiercely contorted as they tried to best each other.

At the start line, Kiros' handsome face twisted into a grin.

'_Well, what do you know... Those two sure make a funny pair. I'll say though, it does seem like they bring out the best in each other, despite their obvious differences. I haven't seen Squall run this passionately since he quit the team. Let's see how they'll do.'_

When they had completed their first lap, Squall's lungs were already starting to hurt and his throat was burning terribly. He had always been an excellent runner – ridiculously fast and blessed with marvelous endurance – but recently, his stamina had been on a steady decline. Of course, he hadn't been practicing like he used to, but he realized that his cutting habit probably wasn't helping things, either. His body was constantly working on replenishing his blood supply, which was quite a daunting job, considering that Squall never ate or slept properly to begin with.

'_Dammit...'_

He was feeling lightheaded, yet knowing that Seifer was only a _breath_ behind him as they were running kept him from simply giving up. Five laps were nothing; he could _do_ this, as long as he put his mind to the task and ignored the pain in his chest and the terrible runner's stitch in his right side.

'_I can... do this... shit...'_

Meanwhile, Seifer was honestly astounded by the brunette's speed. Squall had straight up overtaken him during the second half of the lap, and so far, all of the blond's attempts at reclaiming his former lead had proven to be futile.

'_Holy shit, the little fucker's **fast**...! Guess I underestimated him just a wee bit. Ah, hell, that makes this shit all the more fun!'_

They had already passed all of the other students once – Jeff and his posse included. During their first round, the bully had been too surprised to be of any noteworthy concern, but after last week's fiasco, Seifer knew to be on his guard. Although his mind was mainly on the race, he didn't want to take any risks. Besides, what better excuse than to ensure Squall's safety during their run did he have to fuck with the pesky little thug boy?

He didn't actually take any action, however, until he and Squall had nearly completed their fourth lap. Most other students had carefully moved out of Seifer's and Squall's way, but Jeff had gradually inched closer to their chosen trail on the inside of the track, and it hadn't slipped Seifer's attention.

'_I see what you're doing, asshole. It ain't gonna happen. Watch this.'_

The moment that Squall had passed Jeff for the fourth time, Seifer bitch-slapped the back of the bully's head hard enough to knock him out, despite his open palm. Taken by surprise, Jeff stumbled, bumped into one of his friends and nearly fell flat on his face on the grainy, orange colored turf. To Seifer's genuine disappointment, however, the only parts of Jeff's body that actually made contact with the ground were his bare hands and knees.

'_Aww, man, what a shame... That face was made to hit the turf. Oh well... I suppose for now, we're even.'_

Seifer was smirking as he kept running, knowing well that Jeff was out of the picture for the moment.

Catching up with Squall, however, would be a true challenge.

'_Jeez... I can't even breathe... anymore... **fuck**... well... was worth... the time sink... to know... the kitten's safe... tsk...'_

Panting like a race horse, Seifer finally rang in his fifth lap. He was so close to Squall that he could have touched him... taken a hold of his shirt... pulled him into the grass that covered the football field... planted a fucking kiss on his lips that probably tasted like a salt shaker now from all the sweat... made out with him right then and there...

'_Dammit, this **isn't** helping!'_

Growling deep in his sore throat, Seifer shut down the naughty portion of his brain and exploded forward. He was now head-to-head with his brunette friend, who flicked him a hasty gaze from the left. Seifer was hurting too much to do anything but grin wryly and keep running, but he beamed with pride as they passed a miserable Jeff who was still sitting on the ground, scowling and bitching, surrounded by his cronies. Kiros, apparently, wasn't in any rush to check on his injured student, because he was still standing at the finish line, watching Seifer and Squall going at it.

'_How... funny... fuckin' teachers... hehe... ugh... gonna barf...'_

Spitting out the sudden sour taste in his mouth, Seifer continued to run. They were drawing closer and closer to their goal, and Squall showed no sign of fatigue or slowing down. Seifer struggled to keep up, and he cursed his negligence concerning his morning runs over the past few weeks.

At this rate...

'_He'll win... he'll actually... ow... shit...'_

Although he was aching in places he hadn't even known that he had, Squall Leonhart didn't stop or slow down. He _would_ win this and show Seifer that he was no one to be fucked with... and he would show _himself_ that he could do anything he truly wanted. He knew that he was under an endorphin induced runner's high and that his body was probably going to break apart once he stopped, but at this point, it really didn't matter one goddamn bit.

He was going to _do this_.

When Squall shot across the finish line, he didn't even care anymore whether he had beaten Seifer or not. The boyish rivalry between them was suddenly so insignificant – it probably always had been. More importantly, Squall had beaten his weaker self and the mocking voices in his mind, and this achievement caused him to be overcome by a raw, pure surge of pride – a feeling that he hadn't truly experienced in a long, _long_ time.

When he finally allowed himself to slow down, his lungs felt like they had been ripped to thin strips of flesh and his shaky muscles were burning as if they had been stuck with needles of white-hot fire. With a groan, Squall's knees gave way and he collapsed on the soft grass of the football field where he rolled onto his back, wincing and whimpering at the pain that coursed through his body.

'_I... did it... I... I... made... ugh... I d-didn't... give... Ow, it h-hurts... Ugh... h-hey... w-where... where's Seifer...?'_

Panting, Squall tilted his head to the side, savoring the sensation of soft blades of grass gently sweeping against his cheek, and he felt a sudden rush of affection thrashing through his reluctant heart when he saw Seifer laying on the ground next to him, wheezing just as pathetically. The blond had his legs propped up in a right angle and his quadriceps muscles were twitching violently. His face was flush like a tomato, beaded with sweat, and his crop colored hair stuck flat to his forehead.

Even so... Seifer had never looked more gorgeous.

'_S... shit... I'm... He's... he's so... unh.'_

Letting out a long, guttural groan that ran painfully through his burning throat, Seifer now turned his head as well. Out of gleaming green eyes, he stared at his dark haired friend, utterly in awe over the brunette's rare and raw beauty. Squall's face, pale and sweat-slicked, looked tight and exhausted, but the proud glare in his gaze nearly drove Seifer into insanity, it was that goddamn beautiful.

"You won..." Seifer declared between desperate thrusts of air, forcing a pained, but genuine smile. "I'm... impressed..."

Squall only replied with another tired grunt, pulling at the shirt that clung to his wet torso. He swiped his forearm over his eyes, collecting more sweat with his sleeve. It was so damn _hot_...

"My head's... spinning..." Seifer gasped a moment later, his voice still weak.

"Mine, too..." the brunette groaned. "Fuck..."

"Take me... to lunch...?"

"You have... some nerve... it's... your treat, bastard..."

Despite his breathlessness, Seifer let out a cracked laugh. He couldn't remember ever feeling worse than this, yet he was so freaking happy at the same time that the strangeness of those contrasting emotions didn't even bother him. Something that had long lain dormant inside of Seifer had finally awoken and he was soaring high enough to touch the cerulean blue sky hanging cloudlessly above them, and judging by the adorable sound of the dark haired boy's erratic, but content chuckle next to him, Squall was feeling exactly as satisfied as he was.

'_It... doesn't get much... better than this...'_

"Hey... Squall... you know what...?" the blond asked softly as sweat stung his eyes and he licked the salt from his dry, aching lips.

Grimacing, Squall veered his head around to him further and hissed arduously, "What's that?"

"... Fuck snow."

"..."

Squall only smiled.

* * *

"God, I'm so fuckin' _beat. _I think I'm gonna die. Pass me my urn please, will ya?"

"Shut up, you're not helping."

"Ugh! I'm all _sticky_. Why doesn't that damned school have any showers? I wanna go home and get cleaned up."

"Then stop bitching and do it."

"No way, I'm taking you to lunch!"

"... Whatever."

"Hey, remember Jeff's face?"

"I'm repressing the memory, thanks."

"I mean, when Seagul told him he was a goddamn klutz and needed to look where the fuck he was running. That was the highlight of my day right there. Minus your half-naked ass in the locker room, that is."

"Shut up."

"Seriously, you've got a hot little—"

"You must _really _wanna die today."

Bickering like little kids in a sandbox, the two boys ascended the staircase to "Ward's Diner," where Seifer had promised to buy them lunch. Squall had resisted at first, saying that he didn't want to go eat at the place where he worked, but his hunger and Seifer's persistence had eventually won him over. Usually, the brunette didn't pack lunch for school, because he tended not to be hungry after having breakfast at home. Today, however, was doubtlessly an exception. His stomach had been demanding nourishment rather "vocally" ever since the end of gym class, and Seifer had teased him about it more than just once.

As if on command, Seifer suddenly swiped an intent gaze across Squall's sweatshirt-covered tummy, before he whistled, "Hey, you know... that monster in your gut sure was starting to scare me, kitten. I thought you were going to skin me alive and devour me whole. ... Hmm, then again, I sort of like that thought."

"... You're a pain in the ass," Squall sniped coolly.

"Look who's talking, sunshine."

With a grin, Seifer opened the door to "Ward's" and motioned Squall to go ahead. Still swaying slightly, the brunette proceeded into the inside of the restaurant, and Seifer followed right behind him. It was busy as usual, since many other D.C. High students spent their lunch period at the diner instead of the school cafeteria. Somewhere in front of them, Seifer spotted the huge kid from days ago – Raijin, or whatever the guy's name was.

"Squall...? Uhhh... your shift doesn't start until later, ya know?" the dark haired guy grunted, sounding confused.

"... I know. We're here for some food."

"Ohh... That's unusual, ya know! You never eat here when you don't work, ya know?"

"Right..." Squall drawled painfully.

"Is today somethin' special? You can tell me, ya know."

"..."

They had walked up to the greeter's desk, Squall with his hands submerged in his pockets and looking slightly uncomfortable as he turned his head away from his co-worker, chewing on his bottom lip. Raijin graced him with a confused, but good-natured grin, before changing his focus to Seifer, who had stepped up closely behind Squall to pierce the huge boy with an intimidating, virulently green glare. Seifer had been feeling awfully protective of the brunette over the past couple of days, but who was to blame him? He was in love with this guy, and he'd let no one toy with Squall... not even a harmless oaf like Raijin.

"Wassup, _Rai_?" Seifer greeted the boy arrogantly in order to emphasize his presence, not really caring to receive a response in the first place.

"Oh, hey there... Seifer, right? Good to see you again, ya know?"

"Ya, whatever..." Seifer shrugged. "Can we get some lunch, or what? We only have 30 minutes."

"Uh, sure... just follow me, ya know."

A bit taken aback by Seifer's coldness, Raijin clutched two menus to his massive chest and silently lead them to a table in a quieter section of the restaurant. When the boys had taken their seats across from each other, he placed their menus on the table.

"I need to go back, ya know..."

"Yeah, we know," Seifer sneered. "See ya, Rai."

"Right... have a good lunch, ya know."

"Thanks, Rai," Squall murmured, sliding back and forth in his bench in an indecisive manner before he picked up his menu. He already knew what he wanted, but the pages before him provided a good excuse to not have to look at either Seifer or Raijin.

Seifer watched the greeter retreating from their table sheepishly, before he snapped his gaze to Squall once more. The brunette was holding his menu much higher than was necessary, blocking his face from view, and Seifer chuckled in response.

"You're just too damn cute, cupcake."

There was a pissed off grunt that sounded from behind Squall's menu, but nothing further. With a grin, Seifer decided to leave his classmate be and lazily flipped through the colorful pages in search for a new dish to try. The burgers all sounded pretty good, but just as he was about to ask Squall what he was going to have, Seifer felt someone nudging him in the side quite forcefully.

"What the—"

"Heeey, lookie here! You're back, Seifer! Jeez, I thought I was _never_ going to see you again."

Seifer looked up, but he had already recognized the playful female voice before he even saw Selphie Tilmitt's beaming face. The girl was standing next to their table in her waitress' uniform, holding a notepad and a pencil in one hand, while waving at Seifer with the other.

"Sooo, let's _see, _who are you here with tod—"

Squall finally lowered his menu to the table and gave the girl a blank look from behind silky, dark brown tresses that were still tousled from their exhausting gym class, and Selphie immediately fell silent. Her emerald eyes widened in surprise at the sight of the brunette, and she let out a small, startled gasp.

"Squall? It's _you_? Hey! What are you doing here? Wait a minute, you're here with..."

Her head whisked back to Seifer, who flashed her a roguish smirk that stretched from one ear to the other. Selphie stared at him for a moment, looking bewildered, before she finally started laughing.

"Look at you!" she exclaimed proudly, placing her hands on her hips. "Your court-shipping skills are better than I thought! I'm _impressed_!"

"Court-shipping...?" Squall asked slowly, narrowing his eyes in confusion as he looked from her to Seifer.

"Ahahaha," Seifer laughed giddily into his cupped left hand, mocking girly bashfulness and waving his menu in front of Squall's face like an oversized fan.

"Cut it out," the brunette snarled, slapping the menu away while glaring at the girl. "The hell are you talking about, Selphie?"

"Oh, nothing," she trilled, but gave Seifer an ecstatic thumbs-up. "Anyway, what would you two lovebirds like to drink?"

"Just water for me," Seifer said, expectantly looking at Squall, who performed a hectic, impatient nod. "Two waters, then."

"Okiedokie! Be right back!"

Selphie sashayed away from their table, giggling manically. Squall's pretty features curled in disgust, and with a tone that was sharp like the edge of a knife, he hissed at Seifer, "What the fuck was that all about? 'Lovebirds'? What _exactly_ did you say to her?"

"Nothing in particular," Seifer replied innocently, examining the state of his fingernails.

"'Nothing in particular' my ass! Spit it out!"

"... Uhm, well... Let's see... Oh yeah. Last time I was here, I told her I had the hots for ya and was going to woo the living daylights out of you. Like I said, nothing in particular."

"W-what?" Squall stammered in outrage, suddenly rolling up his menu as if he intended to use it as a weapon. "You did _what_?"

"What? It's true, isn't it?" Seifer shrugged. "Don't get upset, princess."

"This isn't funny! Who do you think you are, telling her something like that? She's a _co-worker_, you asshole!"

"She's not _my_ co-worker. Besides, I didn't tell her that you had the hots for _me_. I told her it was purely one-sided. I mean, you almost murdered me with my silverware that day, and well, now I'm taking you on a lunch date. I can't help it I'm _this_ fuckin' good."

"It doesn't fucking matter what in the hell you _think_ you are! Now she thinks we're... we're..."

"We're _what_, precisely?" Seifer asked, his voice suddenly low and holding a note of warning.

Squall opened his mouth, but shut it again almost immediately. Honestly, he didn't really know how to counter Seifer's question. He still had no idea how to define his relationship with the blond. He and Seifer were neither acquaintances, nor friends, nor lovers – if anything, they were more like a hybrid of the three. Squall wouldn't allow a simple acquaintance to tend to his self-inflicted wounds, and he wouldn't let a mere friend kiss and grope him in the school lavatory. At the same time, Squall believed that true lovers were probably more distinct and certain about their feelings for each other and their relationship than he and Seifer were, and they probably didn't yell at each other as much, either.

This situation was a whole lot weirder than he had initially believed it to be.

"... Whatever," he finally replied, clearing his throat and unrolling his menu to study the words and pictures attentively in order to avoid Seifer's eyes.

Seifer watched him, his chin perched in one hand that he had propped up on the table, but he said nothing. Frankly, he didn't see what the big deal was about Selphie thinking him and Squall might be an item, or anything along those lines. He liked Squall (worshiped his mind-numbing hotness, more like it), Squall liked him (endured his presence, anyway) and Selphie wasn't a homophobe (the opposite, rather...), so what was there to trip out over?

He just didn't get it.

'_... I guess he's new to this whole gay dating thing, huh? I don't think he ever had a boyfriend, anyway. Hell, he probably never even had a **girlfriend**, come to think of it. He's so fuckin' edgy, man. I don't know if he's bi or gay or what. Maybe he doesn't even know himself. Personally, I don't give a rat's ass what anybody thinks about me being bi or us being together, or whatever. It was different when I didn't give a fuck about the guys I hooked up with... I mean, why take shit over somethin' that's fucking **meaningless** to ya anyway? Now, Squall's a totally different story. I'd fuckin' bend over backwards for him, I'll even admit it. My guess is, he's probably just scared shitless of what other people will think. I understand that... to a certain degree. I know I'm more used to this than he is. Still, he needs to lighten up, or he'll drive himself fuckin' crazy. If anyone wants to mess with him, they need to get past **me** first, anyway. I won't let anyone hurt him. As long as I'm around, he's got nothing to worry about.'_

In Squall's eyes, of course, everything was a whole lot more complicated than that. He knew things that Seifer didn't, and he had concerns that Seifer would never comprehend. The blond was right in one aspect, however; Squall was scared, _horribly_scared in fact, because there were certain people – like his parents, for instance – that didn't need to know how serious his feelings for Seifer really were.

Being all too familiar with Kato and his violent, possessive and vindictive nature, Squall thought it safest to keep his relationship with Seifer as low-key as possible.

"Hey, Squall," Seifer suddenly spoke to him softly from across the table, his inflection kind. "Don't worry, okay? Selphie's cool."

"I _know_ she is," Squall bit without looking up, gouging his incision teeth into his bottom lip. "Just shut it."

Selphie Tilmitt was indeed one of the few people whom Squall had always had a decent, cordial relationship with. She was sweet and ever so patient, constantly worried about him and always trying to make him laugh or at least smile. He could tell that she truly cared and that she would never do anything to hurt him on purpose, but the thought of anyone knowing about him and Seifer still made his skin crawl with agitation.

'_Why did he have to tell her? What if he told someone else? Damn him and his loose fucking mouth... It's not like this is anyone's business to begin with! God, I'll kill him.'_

"Did I just hear my name?" a voice next to him trilled playfully. "Nya, I think I diiid!"

Selphie had returned with two full glasses of ice water and carefully set them down on top of the table. She took a quick glimpse at the ominous scowl that overshadowed Squall's face, and she could instantly tell that the brunette was in a foul mood.

'_Uh oh. Maybe I shouldn't have said anything? He looks like he wants to kill me! Sooo scary! Then again, Seifer looks as smug as always. It doesn't look like they had a fight over what I said. Maybe Squally is just in one of his moods.'_

Smiling, she looked from one boy to the other and chirped, "Any idea what you wanna order?"

Seifer glanced at his open menu once more, before he slid it across the table in Selphie's direction.

"Yeah, I'll have that Guacamole Burger with fries."

"Oooh, that's a good one," she said, then shifted her attention to Squall. "What about you, Squally?"

He cringed at the nickname as he always did, his steel blue eyes sparking like storm clouds before a hurricane. Tossing her the menu, he grumbled, "I'll take the soup of the day."

She blinked as he crossed his arms before his chest and turned his head away from her to stare off into space, looking annoyed.

"Don't you wanna know what it is?" she asked.

"No."

"Well, just so you know, it's cream of mushroom."

"Whatever."

"... Just soup? No bread?"

"No."

"But it's _really_ good! You've never had the house bread, right? You should try it, Squall."

"_Fine_, whatever, I'll take the stupid bread."

Selphie was well aware that Squall had only agreed to having the bread in order to make her go away and leave him alone. Sighing, she stashed the menus in the front pouch of her apron and gave Seifer a low-brow look.

"You know, I don't envy you," she said demurely, swiping a pregnant gaze at Squall, who was still ignoring her. "He's such a _crabby_ little monkey."

"Who are you calling a monkey?" Squall hissed, finally turning his head to heed her with a glare that would've driven a lesser woman – or man, even – to their knees.

"_You_! Except monkeys are much cuter and a lot more fun to play with. _You_, on the other hand, are just a grumpy old baboon."

Sticking out her tongue at him, she turned swiftly on her heel and trudged off into the direction of the kitchen, collecting some empty glasses and dirty dishes from other tables on her way. Squall watched her darkly, until he heard Seifer snickering.

"What's so fucking funny?"

The blond was smirking at him, his green eyes alight with impish glee. "She called you a baboon. Aren't those the ones with the bright red butt cheeks? She called you that."

"I _know_ what she called me, I don't need your editorials, dumbass!"

"A _grumpy_ baboon."

"Shut up!"

Seifer continued to cackle softly as he took a sip of his water, his gaze boring into Squall's across the rim of his glass with sudden hunger flaring in his eyes – hunger that could never be satisfied with food alone.

The brunette swallowed.

"Stop looking at me like that, dammit," he muttered, now taking a swig of his drink as well, but looking away from Seifer and at the back of the restaurant instead.

"Why?" the blond cooed, his foot playfully rubbing Squall's leg beneath the table. "Don't tell me you're getting turned on?"

"Like hell."

Seifer winced when the brunette dug his heel into the top of his foot, nearly mashing his toes to pulp of flesh and bone. He could've done it more forcefully, of course, but he figured that Seifer would take the hint. Indeed, the blond retracted his foot immediately, but his face twisted in agony and he sniveled, "Ow! You little bastard! You broke my toe!"

"I did not."

"God, it hurts! They'll have to amputate, I'm sure of it! Oh god, the _pain_...!"

Squall rolled his eyes and continued to chug more of his water, taking overly large gulps, but he couldn't ignore the slight pang of guilt in his chest at Seifer's heartbreaking vocal impression of physical agony. When the blond suddenly shut up, Squall chanced a quick glimpse at Seifer's face to search it for either a sign of jest or true pain, and he regretted doing so immediately.

"Fquall! Fife me fome fettufe pfeafe!"

Squall choked on his water and nearly spewed it across the table when his eyes connected with Seifer's face. This was largely due to the fact that the blond had two long, white straws shoved up his mouth to look like giant rabbit teeth. The blond was smirking at him and held up his hands like a pair of front paws, winking suggestively.

"Oooh, Fquall! You make fif bunny fo forny! Fawf!"

When Seifer waggled his eyebrows at him, Squall couldn't decide whether he should laugh at the outrageous sight or cry at the sudden pain burning in his throat. Truthfully, he wasn't capable of doing either. A large amount of his water had ran down the wrong tube, and he continued to cough at the intrusion, while desperately trying to breathe at the same time.

Needless to say, it wasn't working too well.

Seifer saw him doubling over and immediately spat out the straws. Without hesitating, he rose to his feet and skidded over to his friend to grab Squall's shoulder and begin pounding on his back as Squall hung awry over the table.

"Hey! Squall, you alright? Hey, come on, _breathe_! Squall! _Squall_, come on!"

The brunette was turning red in the face as Seifer drove his fist down between his shoulder blades, trying to clear his airway with the scarce means that he had. Squall continued to choke for several more, agonizing seconds, but just as Seifer started to panic and prepared to pull the brunette out of the bench to perform the Heimlich maneuver, a large hand grasped his biceps and gently, but forcefully, pushed him aside.

"Squall!"

He heard Selphie shouting Squall's name in a shrill voice, and he saw her standing to his left with her hands clutched to her mouth in shock, but the tiny girl was not the one who had shoved him away. Looking to his right in confusion, Seifer now saw a man he didn't know – a _huge_, scarily beefy man who had to weigh well over 300 pounds and looked like he was nearly seven feet tall. He was wearing a dark blue 'Ward's' polo shirt, a light blue bandana wrapped around his head and a long, dirty white apron that looked like it was specked with blood, but Seifer hardly even noticed this. Thunderstruck, he watched how the man curled his enormous hands around Squall's thin waist and pulled the boy out of the bench like a doll.

"Squall!" Seifer gasped, helplessly extending one arm, but Selphie clutched his hand and pulled him back.

"_No_, Seifer!" she sobbed, shaking her head, "Ward knows what he's doing!"

Indeed, the giant she had referred to as "Ward" gently held on to Squall's torso as he lifted the boy in the air and finally flipped him around to push the brunette's back against his own, massive chest. Squall's shuffling feet in the black leather boots weren't even touching the ground as the man wrapped his arms around Squall's waist from behind and immediately began to thrust his hands into the dark haired teen's lower abdomen.

"_Squall!_"

Seifer couldn't tell whether he or Selphie had cried out, but they both froze up and squeezed each other's hands more tightly when Squall gave one last, desperate cough and finally became lax in the man's arms. He was hanging limply in Ward's embrace for what seemed like eternity, but finally, with his heart nearly bursting in his chest from anxiety, Seifer heard him groaning and saw him moving.

"Shit...! Squall!"

With his lips upturning into a smile, Ward loosened his grip on Squall and carefully sat the boy back down on the bench like a little kid. Squall was pale as a ghost and still let out a few small, erratic coughs, but to everyone's tremendous relief, he looked to be alright.

Without their notice, the entire restaurant had gone silent and anxiously watched Ward perform the Heimlich on the choking teen. Some knew Squall from school and most didn't particularly like him, but everyone started clapping and cheering for Ward at the obvious success of the grumpy boy's rescue.

Seifer, however, stood stock still, hearing none of the tumultuous crowd. He was still clutching Selphie's hand, and the girl winced at the bruising power of his grasp.

"Seifer," she murmured, gently petting his arm. "It's okay, he's alright! Squall's fine, see? You can let go of my hand now..."

Absentmindedly, Seifer unclenched his fingers and released her hand. He didn't once stop staring at Squall out of bloodshot, burning green eyes. The brunette was sitting on the bench with his elbows on his knees and his head lowered, panting slightly. Ward had perched down before him, one large hand on Squall's trembling shoulder.

"Better?" the statuesque man asked, his deep, baritone voice streaked with kindness.

Squall nodded and ran one hand across his face, drawing wet breaths through his nose as he murmured a "thanks". Finally, he looked up. His dark blue eyes were narrowed from the shock and the strain, glittering with difficultly suppressed tears. He tried a weak half-smile for Ward's sake, but failed miserably. The man squeezed his shoulder in a soothing gesture, then stood up.

Seifer saw the man turning towards him from the corners of his eyes, but he vehemently refused to take his gaze off Squall.

"Are you okay, boy?" Ward asked, studying Seifer's blank features. "Kid...? Come on, snap out of it."

"Seifer," Selphie whispered, rubbing the blond's back. "Seifer, he's _okay_. He's not hurt. It wasn't bad, it was just water. It's okay now!"

"Seifer," the brawny man said evenly, having picked up on the blond boy's name. "Look at me."

The eighteen year old didn't turn his head until Ward had placed both of his hands on his shoulders and was shaking him slightly. With reluctance, he met the man's sharp, cerulean blue eyes, reading concern there. Ward's face was strong-jawed, deeply creased and very grim looking, but the giant restaurant owner still managed to appear friendly, somehow.

"Don't worry, Seifer. Squall is going to be just fine," he said, the calm urgency in his voice finally snaring Seifer's attention. "You have to be more careful, son. If Squall had been eating, this could've ended on a more serious note, do you understand?"

Seifer nodded slowly, still feeling horribly shook up. Meanwhile, Squall had tilted his head aside and was monitoring the scene from behind long, astray bangs that cascaded into his eyes. The brunette worried over the detached expression he saw on Seifer's face. Squall's heart was racing in his chest, his throat was aching horribly and he was embarrassed over the attention this silly incident had caused, but for some weird reason, he wasn't angry at Seifer for what had happened. Quietly, he watched how Ward was talking to the blond in a hushed voice, and Seifer looked anything but happy.

"It's alright, Seifer," Ward murmured soothingly to the terrified blond.

"I..."

"Everything's fine. You just be more careful from now on, okay?"

"I didn't mean to... I just... I just wanted to make him laugh... shit..." Seifer explained helplessly, his voice trailing off as he pressed the palm of his right hand to his forehead.

Ward watched him squirming a few more seconds, before he smiled very gently and patted the top of Seifer's head.

"I know you didn't mean to, Seifer. It was just an accident. You're a good kid."

Seifer almost buckled under the powerful man's touch, and he was somewhat relieved when Ward turned away from him. The man scrutinized Squall's improving condition one last time and finally disappeared back into the kitchen. Seifer didn't even notice how the man wordlessly motioned Selphie to follow him and the dark blond girl reluctantly followed suit; his gaze was on Squall alone, and the brunette was looking back at him out of tired, unsure eyes.

When Squall suddenly forced a feeble smile onto his lips, whose sole purpose was to reassure Seifer that everything was fine, the blond could no longer hold back.

Seifer walked up to Squall and, without warning, pulled the brunette onto his feet and into a crushing embrace. His arms encircled the brunette's smaller body vigorously, and Squall gasped at the abruptness of the contact. He could hear Seifer breathing into his ear – chopped, short thrusts of air that gave away the blond's distress almost as much as his desperate, trembling grasp on Squall's waist and shoulders did. The brunette tried to raise his arms, which were pinned against his sides, but even the attempt in itself was entirely pointless. Seifer didn't allow him to move even an inch.

"Seifer," he tried, attempting to speak even though his face was mashed against the blond's throat. "Seifer, let go."

He heard a few of the other guests whisper and giggle, but it didn't bother him as much as it should have. Seifer's fiercely intimate hug, however, was starting to hurt his ribcage, which was still sore from all the coughing his body had been put through.

"Hey, take it easy," he whispered, his smooth voice now comforting and calm as he breathed against the other boy's skin that still smelled faintly of grass and sweat. "You're gonna break my ribs, you know..."

"S-shit..."

"Everything's alright... I'm _fine_. You can let go."

"I'm so... sorry..."

"Don't be. I'm okay, stupid."

"I didn't mean to—"

"I know. I know..."

"I... I thought you were going to die...!"

"I don't _die_ that easily, idiot... It was just water. But you're really starting to hurt my chest, okay? I can't breathe."

This casual remark gave Seifer the motivation he had needed to finally inch back and grant Squall some room to move and collect himself. The brunette was paler than usual, but he was also smiling wryly as he managed to free his hands and gently smacked Seifer upside the head.

"Let go, dumbass," he sighed, faking annoyance. "I'm fine! Jeez. You're a royal pain in the ass..."

Seifer seemed skeptic, but perhaps he was simply reluctant to let Squall go, whether they were surrounded by a whole room full of curious spectators or not. When Squall realized that Seifer wasn't simply going to back down, he made his request heard by pushing his elbow more demandingly in the center of the other boy's chest, slowly edging them apart.

"Sit down," he ordered, frostiness replacing the once warmer shade of his voice. To emphasize his point when the blond continued to refuse to move, he jabbed his chin in the direction of Seifer's seat, growling softly. "Sit. The fuck. _Down_."

"Alright... alright... I got it."

With a defeated grunt, Seifer let go of Squall's body and retreated to his side of the table, where he finally slid into the bench and sat down heavily. Straightening out his tight black sweater, Squall assumed a seating position as well, ignoring the various interested gazes he could feel burning into the side of his face.

This was the kind of attention he really _didn't _need.

Squall wondered whether he should be upset, and why, no matter how intently he searched his insides for even the tiniest, most insignificant spark of fury, he just couldn't find one. He couldn't remember the thoughts that had spiraled through his mind while he had been choking and his vision had nearly gone black before his eyes, but he remembered Seifer's face, his voice, his touch – and he clearly recalled the guilt and the worry that had shone in the blond's emerald eyes... that were still shining there now.

'_How bothersome...'_

Flicking some unruly strands of hair out of his face, Squall purposely focused on the two white straws that lay abandoned before them on the tablecloth, his forehead creasing thoughtfully.

'_Come to think of it... his stupid rabbit impression was kind of funny. I used to do that with Ell, before—'_

When a large, bronze-skinned hand suddenly reached for the straws and picked them up off the table, Squall's head snapped up and his grey-blue eyes met with Seifer's daunting green ones. Squall studied the blond with a mostly neutral gaze, but his cool façade eventually slipped when he noted the lingering somberness on Seifer's handsome face.

"Stop looking at me like it's my fucking _funeral_, dammit!" Squall commanded, his tone deliberately bitchy as he sliced the air with his right hand. "It's getting annoying."

"... I'm really sorry, Squall. I... I really..."

"Oh, come the fuck _off it_ already. I'm still alive, aren't I?"

"But... I just... it was my fault, I-"

"You know, you've never struck me as the kinda guy who wallows in his own stupid guilt and self-pity. What the hell's the matter with you?"

Squall saw Seifer's Adam's apple moving as the blond swallowed and his gaze slid to the left to some unoccupied booth. His face had been wiped of its usual pride and cockiness, leaving behind a guy who looked abnormally vulnerable and insecure. Squall hadn't seen this side of Seifer, and he wasn't quite sure how to deal with it. He couldn't understand why the blond was making such a fuss over what had happened – everything was alright, and for some reason, Squall actually felt even more fond of Seifer now than he had minutes before.

'_I suppose when you think you're seriously going to croak, even for just a hundredth of a second, you kind of appreciate some things more than you did before... Ah, whatever. I just want him to pull out of it and be his usual annoying self. He's got no reason to be so fucking **mopey**, dammit!'_

Unfortunately, there were a few secret, painful patches that littered Seifer's past, too – some that the blond didn't generally share with anyone. They were dark fears and even darker memories that he kept hidden beneath a make-believe surface of arrogance, ignorance and smugness, allowing nobody to see how he sometimes truly felt inside.

It had never occurred to Seifer before how hypocritical he really was for prying into Squall's most intimate thoughts without giving away any of his own in return.

"Seifer, seriously, don't make me throw something at you," Squall tried, a cynical shade of humor to his tone.

"Don't..." Seifer said with a strange coloring to his voice, grinding his teeth.

Squall ignored the sharp gleam in the blond's eyes.

"_Don't_? Yeah, right. I can do whatever I damn well please! If you're being such a—"

"... My best friend choked to death."

Squall bit back whatever else he had meant to say, because his mind had gone blank at Seifer's revelation and his blue eyes had snapped wide in shock. Staring at the blond from across the table in powerless silence, he finally saw the immeasurable hurt in Seifer's gaze and the pained twitch of the corners of his mouth.

He looked like he was wrestling up all the strength he possessed in order to keep himself from breaking down and crying.

"W-what?" Squall eventually whispered unsteadily, not knowing what else to say or do.

The blond ran his hand through his hair in distress, incapable of hiding the way his fingers were trembling as they intertwined with the short, golden tresses. He darted aimless looks around the room, until he came to understand that it was pointless to avoid the subject any longer. With a wounded sigh, he finally focused on Squall's pretty features, and he was relieved by the true, unguarded concern that he read there.

"Yeah," he said softly, semiconsciously tracing the tablecloth with his fingertips. "I was eleven when he died. We both were. It happened during a track and field meet at our middle school. He was so... fuckin' _stupid_... I told him not to run with that gum ball in his mouth..."

Seifer flinched, then faked a smile that died again almost immediately. Squall simply sat there, staring at his classmate with unexplained anguish in his heart.

"Anyway... I'm over it..." Seifer continued and vaguely waved his hand in dismissal, although both of them knew well that Seifer wasn't 'over it' by any means. "It's a fucked up way to see someone die, especially when you don't know what to _do_ about it 'cause you're just a dumb kid. Seeing you like that just now... scared the shit out of me... I mean, I learned how to do the Heimlich maneuver after that incident with Luke, but I still felt fuckin' useless today, anyway."

The brunette pondered those words for a moment, and there were ghosts of the past that rose up in the back of his mind, too. With a sigh, he suddenly turned his head away and said, in a voice grating with emotion, "You're not useless, idiot..."

When Seifer felt Squall's foot nudging his own beneath the table, even if only chastely and only for one second, it was clear to him that this was the brunette's clumsy method of showing him that he wasn't the cold hardass he always pretended to be. Squall cared - in his own, unrefined way – and Seifer couldn't possibly have been more thankful.

"Hey, you guys... I have your food."

Selphie had approached their table, balancing two trays of food in her hands. She was smiling that pretty, carefree smile of hers, but her eyes carefully searched their faces. She seemed to approve of what she found, because she finally sat a plate with fries and a burger down before Seifer, and a bowl of soup with bread in front of Squall.

"You better eat up so you won't be late for class," she ordered, her hands on her hips in a matronly fashion. "And, uhm... Seifer?"

"Yeah?"

"Give this to Irvine for me, okay?"

Seifer blinked at the sudden off-coloring to her voice. When his eyes reluctantly roved from the mouthwatering image of his guacamole burger to her face, he was surprised by the pink flush on her cheekbones. Selphie was holding a carefully folded piece of paper in her tiny hand, and she thrust it out for him to grasp.

"Here, take it, pleaaase," she begged. "Before I change my mind!"

"... Is that what I _think_ it is?"

She heaved a despairing sigh and whined, "Just _take it_, okay?"

"You're not really giving that horn-ball Irvine your phone number?" Squall asked with a disapproving dryness to his voice.

When Selphie let out another sound of frustration, Seifer quickly snatched the small piece of notebook paper from her, grinning slyly.

"I see," he drawled, looking pleased. "So, what made you change your mind?"

"I dunno," she said, raising her shoulders. "Jealousy, perhaps."

"_Jealousy?_" Seifer repeated, cocking a brow. "The hell do you mean?"

"Well, it must be because I've been watching you guys today. You two are just so _cute_ together," she beamed, happily ignoring Squall's snort of indignation.

"I _know_!" the brawny blond agreed in his best girly impression, grasping Selphie's hands in his own as she jumped up and down in front of him. "We're like, _sooo_ made for each other!"

"Yes, you are!" the girl squealed, still bouncing excitedly. "Ah, Seifer, you make me so _proud_!"

With a frown that suggested murder, Squall shoved a spoonful of soup in his mouth and scarfed down a slice of bread, muttering deviously to himself about how exactly Selphie and Seifer were going to "mysteriously" drop from the face of the planet that day. From the corner of his eyes, he watched his two psychotic friends egging each other on, seemingly celebrating their utter and moronic weirdness.

'_Like two peas in a fucking pod. Jeez.'_

Deep down, however, Squall was glad to see the smile returning to Seifer's face. Finally, the blond seemed as carefree and obnoxious as ever before. He even scribbled his own phone number on a napkin and gave it to the hyperactive girl, ordering her to call him if Irvine ever stepped out of line and she needed someone to kick his sorry ass. Somehow, Squall thought, it was just like Seifer to offer something of that sort.

'_Not like he **needs** a reason to pick a fight with anyone. He's such a primate. Then again... I guess he's just being nice...'_

Nibbling on his spoon in deep thought as he traced the lines of the blond's nose, mouth and chin with his eyes, Squall didn't even flinch when Seifer's foot brushed against his own once more. Squall shot the blond a silent glare and gave a tiny snarl of warning, but he didn't alter the position of his legs – not even when Seifer, ever the stupid prick, winked at him with the smugness of ten horny playboys glowering in his perfect green eyes.

Squall didn't move his leg that day and he didn't stun away from Seifer's touch, nor the kiss that was later placed on his lips in the sun-warmed cabin of a bright red pickup truck – because in the end, some feelings were just too powerful to be stopped by even the darkest and profoundest trenches of denial.


	20. Good Enough

-:-**  
Chapter 20  
Good Enough**

"_Some things you'll never understand until you try them."_  
-:-

"Hey, that looks like a good place to make babies! Or what about over there...? Hm... Say, you don't mind laying buck naked on your back in some pine needles, do you?"

"... I can't believe I agreed to this. I must've been out of my fucking mind."

"Aw, _c'mon_, don't be such a sourpuss. I'm willing to take some spiky ass needles to the knees to make sweet _love _to you in the wilderness, you know. You'd better lighten up in gratitude here!"

"How about I light _you_ up, jackass?"

"Ooh... Sinister little thing, aren't ya? I swear, you toss death threats around like some party freak who finally got his hands on the confetti."

"..."

"If I didn't know full well that you're actually _serious_ about setting my ass on fire, I'd say it was the cutest fuckin' thing."

Snickering gleefully, Seifer watched with interest how the steel blue eyes of the brunette sitting to his right narrowed in a sullen, 'call me cute one more time and I'll bash your face in' kind of grimace. Squall acted like he was in a vindictive mood – as usual – but Seifer knew him well enough by now to be able to tell that the chocolate haired teen's overt crankiness was merely on the surface. In fact, Seifer would've placed a wager on his left nut that Squall was feeling distinctly more cheerful than he pretended to be.

Alas, it was a gorgeous, cloudless Friday afternoon, and they had been released from class for the weekend about two or three hours ago. Seifer had picked up the brunette at the end of Squall's French class, cracking dirty jokes all the way to his pickup truck. They had agreed on taking Seifer's truck to the mountain range of Alclad, although Squall had initially insisted on riding his bike instead. Seifer, however, had intended for this trip to be an opportunity to spend some quality time with the ice princess (in _one_ and the _same _vehicle, mind), and he had proven to be astonishingly convincing. After stubbornly pestering Squall all week during art classes, math classes, lunch breaks and on the phone, the dark haired teen had finally cracked under the constant pressure and submitted to Seifer's demand, if only because he was sick of hearing about it.

Thus, they had left Squall's Honda motorcycle in the school parking lot, where it would be safe and sound for at least a few hours. They had even stopped by Ward's and bought a mount of sandwiches, fresh fruit and cold drinks for the trip, which were now stowed away in a plastic bag on the floor between Squall's legs.

Swiping an appraising sideways glance at the brunette through his black Oakley sunglasses, Seifer found that Squall looked as ridiculously stunning as always. The dark haired youth was sitting nonchalantly with his right arm propped up in the opening of the passenger window, which he had rolled down some time ago to fully savor the fresh mountain air. He was clad in black boots, washed out, loose blue jeans, a dark leather belt and two shirts, which he had layered fashionably. One was long, hooded and light grey, with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, the other short and black, embellished with the intricate logo of some metal band that Seifer had never even heard of. Squall was also donning a black and white baseball hat, which Seifer had never seen him wear before. He had pulled the visor low into his face, and although it obscured the brunette's fine features from view in a totally unfavorable manner, Seifer still considered it a surprisingly cute look for his frosty classmate. Of course, the brunette was wearing his leather wristbands, too; they actually complimented his edgy style well, even if their true functionality was far beyondthat of any ordinary fashion accessory.

'_Right... I was going to talk to him about that whole damn... cutting... **thing**...,' _Seifer thought, breathing a quiet, misplaced sigh as he shifted his attention from Squall's profile back to the road._'Ahh, maybe I should save that talk for later, though. Seriously, I have no desire to ruin the whole fuckin' trip right from the start. Took me enough coaxing to even get him to come out here with me. He's such a stubborn little brat.'_

Seifer rubbed the palm of his right hand over his jean-clad thigh, ridding himself of a few annoying beads of sweat that slicked his skin; the late summer sun was still blazing, and it made his leather-wrapped steering wheel somewhat uncomfortable to grasp. Squall, meanwhile, had stuck his arm out the window and was splaying the fingers of his right hand against the wind, which felt so refreshingly brisk and cool. Despite the hat, tendrils of his dark brown hair were blowing into his face and his grey-blue eyes, but Squall didn't seem to mind this at all. The commonly tight line of his mouth was loose and actually twitched into the vaguest hint of a smile every now and then as he quietly followed his own trails of thought. Honestly, the brunette seemed to be enjoying himself up in the wild Alclad mountain range. It sort of made Seifer wonder whether the brunette visited the area often.

"Hey, Squall," he exclaimed, speaking louder than usual to overpower the howling noise caused by their open windows and the radio droning in the background. "You've been up here before, right?"

Squall flicked him a neutral gaze, staring at him in expressionless silence for a few seconds. Although he pretended _not_ to be, the brunette was actually fascinated by the bright sunlight bouncing off Seifer's wind-rustled blond hair in all imaginable facets of pure, spun gold. Seifer was wearing a simple white tank top that showed off his black tribal tattoo and clung in _all _the right fucking places, doing everything to enhance his sculptured physique, without making it look like he was trying too hard. Eventually, the eighteen year old noticed Squall's vacant-eyed look-over and flashed him a cocky, pearl white grin that would have brought any girl to her knees.

"I'm one _sexy _son of a bitch, aren't I?"

Of course, Squall Leonhart was anything _but_ a girl, and he'd never allow the blond to take him down _that _easily. Not bothering with a reply that Seifer would only use against him, anyway, Squall rolled his eyes in irritation and demonstratively looked away.

'_Moron. How can anyone be so **full **of themselves? And how did he manage to live this long without anyone finishing him off for being so damn annoying, anyway?'_

"Yep, it's hard work to be _this_ fuckin' hot," Seifer cooed as artfully as he could, running his fingers through his hair. "But anyway, back to my question - have you been here before, or what?"

Squall's eyes darted to the left once more, holding Seifer's gaze, but he knew better than to openly stare at the blond again. Moving his shoulders in a demure shrug, he answered with a bored inflection, "A few times."

"Really? Sweet. I haven't been around mountains too much myself... Balamb's rather fuckin' flat, ya know."

"Yeah... I know."

Seifer immediately tilted his head in curiosity.

"Really, you '_know'_, huh?" he quipped slyly. "Are you tellin' me that you've been to Balamb before, kitten?"

The brunette shrugged again, although Seifer found that the gesture looked decidedly more evasive the second time around.

"Yeah, a long time ago," Squall responded reluctantly, slowly turning his head towards the open window to sever their eye contact. "I haven't been there in years."

"Why not? It's not that far away and it _is_ kinda cool when you know where to go for fun," Seifer retorted, sounding excited. "Of course, I've got it all figured out; I was born and raised there and all, ya know. Prime, purebred Balamb meat, baby! Finer than frog's hair!"

When the dark haired boy simply grunted abjectly in reply and refused to turn back around to him, Seifer cocked a brow and drawled, "So... I take it you didn't grow up in Deling City, either, did ya?"

Squall eyed him warily from the corner of his eyes, apparently assessing the situation and determining whether Seifer was worthy of knowing any intimate details about his childhood or not. After a few seconds of hesitation, the brunette's decision was obviously in Seifer's favor, because he confirmed the blond's guess by vaguely shaking his head.

"No," he admitted, his voice sounding petulant and strange. "I didn't."

"Where did you grow up, then?"

"... Timber."

"Timber?" Seifer snorted arrogantly. "That hick town? How in the hell did you end up _there_?"

"I was _born_ there," Squall explained indignantly, but then he paused and suddenly looked pensive. "... I guess, technically, I grew up in Timber and Esthar..."

"Wow," the blond let out a wolf whistle. "Esthar, huh? Damn. That place is somethin' else. Nothin' but bars, casinos, strip clubs and sweet ass beaches as far as the drunken eye can see. Well, that's what I've heard, anyway. I've never had the pleasure to go there myself. How is it? Any fun?"

Squall continued to wordlessly stare out the window, but despite the unfavorable angle, Seifer could tell that something in the other boy's face had changed. He looked stiffer than before, and almost detached from reality. Regardless of the fact that Seifer was naturally curious about Squall's upbringing, he swiftly decided to change the subject, if only because he had no intentions of ruining the brunette's mood entirely if he could help it.

"Well, shit sure is getting _steep_, ain't it?" he declared lightly as they started to ascend a sharply sloping gravel road up the western mountainside of the Alclad. There were no guardrails to their left and right, only grassy drop-offs that were steadily getting rockier and scarily acute in degree as they continued on their way. There were only very few other cars on the road, and the environment was much hotter, drier and dustier than around Deling City. Gnarly looking trees were scattered randomly around the wide open fields and rocky hillsides, as well as a sharp dusting of bushes and flowers along the road that looked rather shriveled and stunted in their growth.

"You _sure _you're not afraid of heights?" Seifer teased after they had been ascending the road for a few minutes. "There aren't any guardrails, you know."

Squall sneered softly.

"Astute, aren't you."

"Damn right I am. Seriously, though, you sure you're gonna be okay, sweet cheeks? If you get scared, you can hold on to my arm for moral support," the blond smirked, flexing his right biceps on top of the console that divided their seats. "The tickets to this gun show are _all_ yours, baby."

"I think I'll pass, thanks," the brunette quipped, looking disgusted as he turned up his nose.

"You don't even know what you're passin' up, lover boy."

"Yeah, and I'd like to keep it that way," Squall replied dryly.

"Hey, look over there!" Seifer suddenly cried out, excitedly jabbing his finger past Squall's head towards a valley on their immediate right. It looked astoundingly green and lush, at least from a distance and compared to the rest of the landscape, which seemed to be in desperate need of a decent rain shower. Due to the extreme altitude, Seifer figured that the place never got much rain to begin with. For a moment, he wondered why that valley - which could apparently be reached by a side road that he spotted a little ways up ahead - was flourishing in comparison to everything else, but then he noticed a huge patch of deepest blue in the midst of all the green, which could only mean...

"Whoa, it's a _lake_!" he whistled. "Man, that thing is way up here!"

"... It's a reservoir, not a lake," Squall corrected him sedately.

"Oh, really?"

"Yeah. It's manmade. They call it 'Cosmo Canyon'. People come up here to boat and fish."

"Why Cosmo Canyon? Huh, huh?" Seifer demanded with the same unnerving bounciness and diligent curiosity of a five year old.

"I guess you get a pretty good view of the stars at night," the dark haired boy explained, sounding unenthusiastic as he cut his eyes to the floor, staring at his own feet. "I don't know. Who cares."

Seifer studied him with meticulous interest.

"... A good view of the stars at night, you say? Why, doesn't that sound fuckin' _romantic_! Have you ever checked it out?"

"No."

"No... hm, well that's just too bad," Seifer grunted, gazing at the large reservoir past Squall's lowered head, before cracking a huge grin. "We might have to rectify that some time, cupcake. So, uhm, how high up are we, anyway?"

The brunette shrugged. "About 8,000 feet, I guess. The top of the Alclad is like 12,000 feet."

"Damn. What altitude is D.C. at?"

"Around 5,000 feet, I think."

"That's still pretty high... I remember it took me a while to get used to the altitude. I had nosebleeds and I couldn't run for _shit_ at first. It sucked major ass."

"... Yeah."

The blond snickered impishly and licked his lips in a way that made Squall's skin crawl.

"I'll suck _your_ ass, if you want."

"Shut up."

"Or any other body par—"

"Put a fuckin' sock in it, will you? Do you really wanna die that badly?"

"If you make it worth my while," the blond crooned suggestively. "C'mon, whaddaya say? I promise I'll make it worth _your_ while..."

Squall twitched, managing to look both cute and chilling at the same time.

"Worth stabbing you in the face with a fucking fork, maybe," he hissed softly, baring an interestingly long set of incisors.

"Tche," Seifer snorted unperturbedly. "Yeah, right. You don't even _have_ a fork, cupcake."

With a very small and cynical smile, the brunette whisked a white plastic fork (which was still wrapped in flimsy cellophane) out of the bag that they had brought from Ward's, which had been sitting between his feet. Twirling it in his right hand slowly and glaring at Seifer from beneath the visor of his hat in a very challenging way, he declared snidely, "Actually, I brought one just for the occasion."

"Gee. Aren't you ever the prepared one, huh?" Seifer said with a half-smile.

"No. You're just too fucking _predictable_."

"Yeah, sure. You're such a little boy scout, I tell ya," the other teen grinned. "I think you should've worn your cute little uniform instead of bringing the cutlery, kitten. I would've liked that."

Squall was wearing that scowl again, but Seifer found the sight thoroughly adorable, and very inspiring at that. With a smirk that suggested trouble, his right hand crawled across the smooth black leather surface of the wide console that separated them, and without giving Squall any warning whatsoever, he grabbed the brunette's left forearm and pulled it towards himself.

"Wha—? Hey! Let go!" Squall snapped, grimacing in horror when Seifer's larger, warmer hand curved around his leather-enveloped wrist. Then, Seifer clutched his hand firmly with his own, securing it in place on top of the console while craftily entwining their fingers. "What in the _hell_ are you doing?"

"Uhm, holding your hand?"

Quite amused, Seifer noticed how the dark haired boy's eyes flashed irately as he tried to yank his arm back.

"No _shit_!" Squall snapped, his inflection almost hysteric. "Let go, dammit! I'm not a _girl_, alright!"

"Aw, but you're blushing like one."

"... I hope you've enjoyed the use of your arm while it _lasted_," Squall spat, furiously tearing the cellophane wrapping of the plastic fork with his teeth and snatching it with his free hand.

Seifer merely let out a bark of laughter and squeezed his hand more tightly in return.

"Stop laughing, you _ass_! It's not funny, dammit!" the younger teen screamed angrily, his weapon of choice in hand.

"... It's not _supposed_ to be funny, Squall."

The cool, clandestine tone in Seifer's voice caught the brunette off guard. With a mistrusting expression, he glared daggers at the blond boy from the side, but Seifer was only smiling at him very gently, the jeer suddenly wiped from his face. His hand felt warm against Squall's cooler, paler skin, and his fingers seemed much heavier and stronger in comparison to the brunette's long, sinewy ones. The weight of his hand on Squall's actually felt good - unexpectedly comforting and reassuring, in a way. The brunette gulped. Seifer looked so damn... _strange_ sitting there, all calm and collected, gazing at him out of those stupid green cat eyes with fierce and intimidating infatuation.

Knowing full well that he was looking defeat straight in the eye, Squall finally chucked the fork to the floor in frustration and silently gave in to a force that had always been much greater than him to begin with.

Seifer found Squall's equally pissy and docile behavior both unsurprising and intriguing at the same time. The brunette's long fingers were twitching against his own nervously, and dammit, they were like fucking _icicles_, all cold and clammy and whatnot. Squall wasn't returning the pressure that Seifer was slowly exerting on his hand; he just kind of sat there, remaining motionless while staring out the window in a blue-eyed stupor.

"... Have you ever held hands with anyone before?" Seifer asked bluntly, rubbing the inside of Squall's palm with his thumb, daringly testing the waters.

The dark haired teen let out a sound of annoyance, not turning around.

"What a stupid question," he grunted resentfully.

"Well, maybe so, but a _question_ all the same."

The brunette veered to his left just slightly, his lips pressed together and his chin rose up in a rather transparent pretense of pride. "... Of course I have."

"Really," Seifer purred, not believing one word of it. "Say, how many girlfriends and boyfriends _have _you had, exactly?"

"None of your business."

"Aw, c'mon, I'm just asking!" the blond pleaded, trying hard to be convincing while keeping some of his attention focused on the road. "Just give me your best guesstimate, okay? I promise I'll tell you how many I've had! Well, I'll try, anyway... I, uh, kinda lost count..."

"I really don't give a rat's ass," Squall bit.

The blond clicked his tongue playfully and leered, "But I do."

"Tough shit. Just because _you're _into snooping around other people's business doesn't mean we all are. Some of us actually know what the word '_privacy_' means."

Seifer grunted in mock hurt, "... Ouch. Burn, cupcake."

Instead of making another snappy comeback, Squall merely sneered, obviously content with Seifer's reaction, and he quickly looked away.

Of course, Seifer hadn't honestly expected the brunette to tell him about his former relationships, no matter how many there had been – _if_ there had been any at all. It was really difficult to guess how sexually and romantically experienced Squall truly was; granted, he wasn't _totally _oblivious, but he couldn't have slept around too much either, or so Seifer figured. In the end, Squall had never struck him as "easy" to begin with – rather, the polar opposite of the term. Besides, Seifer found it hard to believe that anyone before him had racked up the patience to hang out with, let alone _date_ the dark haired ice princess.

'_Hmph... oblivious or not, if I was **really **his first, he'd be more clumsy than this. He knows the deal... kissing, making out, ya know, that kinda basic stuff. He gets all flustered and shit, but he does have some kind of concept of what he's doing, I think. Then again, he might be a natural. Hah. Yeah, right. I'd bet my nuts he's a virgin. I mean, just freakin' look at him! "Untouchable" doesn't even **begin **to describe it. I doubt anyone was ever brave enough to try and get into his pants, what with the whole castration threats and whatnot. Nope... I say this one's gonna require the good old Almasy studding.'_

"... Do you come up here often, kitten?"

Mildly surprised by the fact that Seifer had dropped the subject so freely, Squall glanced at him from beneath his baseball hat, grey eyes sparking with the intensity of a thunderstorm. Flicking his gaze out the front window at the gnarly trees, steep drop-offs and jagged rock formations streaking by, the brunette nodded very carefully.

"... Sometimes."

"Must be fun riding up this thing on your bike," Seifer suggested with a boyish smile, still holding on to Squall's somewhat clammy hand.

"Yeah. It is."

"Did you ever draw it?"

Squall threw the blond a puzzled look, tilting his head at the odd and unexpected question. "Draw what?"

"The Alclad. Cosmo Canyon. This whole area."

The brunette shook his head. "... No."

"Why not?"

Seifer could tell by the strange, detached expression on Squall's face that he had honestly caused the boy to think. Squall didn't seem to know how to answer or counter that question, and in the end, his face fell and he replied very truthfully, "... I don't know."

The blond grinned gently in return, giving Squall's hand a long, sure squeeze. "Well, you should do it some day."

Honestly, Squall had never even considered that idea before. He had never drawn, nor taken photos or videos on his many trips to the Alclad. Perhaps because he liked to preserve this place in his mind, precisely as it was, giving no one the opportunity to figure out just how important and precious it really was to him. If he would plaster pictures of Cosmo Canyon all over his room, someone was just bound to ask questions and make assumptions, only to ruin it all in the end.

_Someone_...

It had been this way with everything that Squall had ever held dear. Kato couldn't seem to stand the thought that his stepson harbored feelings towards anyone or anything that didn't have to do with _him_. Those feelings didn't even have to be romantic in nature – just any kind of sentimental thought or expression sparked jealousy and hatred in the man. He would break what he could, and the rest he simply twisted to such a degree that Squall could no longer stand to hold on to it, no matter how much he initially might've wanted to.

The brunette's whole body went numb at the thought of how Kato would react once he'd comprehend the full magnitude of Squall's feelings for _Seifer_. Of course, he couldn't just have him euthanized as he had done with Griever, but there was no doubt in Squall's mind that the cruel bastard would come up with some other sick idea. Squall wished that he could have stopped the gradual progression of this relationship and erased Seifer from his life, for both his own sake _and_ the blond's, but he had reached a point where this was no longer possible.

Seifer had started an avalanche of feelings within him, and there was no way of stopping it. He'd either run from it, or be buried beneath.

"Why are you shaking?"

Startled, he glanced at the blond, who was returning his gaze with a worried glow in his clear, emerald eyes. Realizing that they were still joined at the hands and Seifer had probably felt him tensing at the thought of Kato, Squall quickly forced a smile and said, "Nothing. It's just windy, that's all."

He should have known that any kind of smile on his lips would cause Seifer to be even more alarmed than he had been. It was too rare of a sight in itself, and Squall never used the gesture this casually to begin with. Sure, it was pretty windy with the windows open as they were, but it wasn't cold by any means. The tremors in Squall's hand had been very drawn out and conspicuous, and they had been concerning. The dark haired boy was holding purposely still now, watching the landscape fly by with his head slightly lowered and his lips pursed shut.

'_... What are you hiding from me?'_

The question had lodged itself into Seifer's brain, gradually driving him nuts. _Why_ he felt that Squall was keeping some kind of secret from him, he couldn't even say. It was just something that Seifer knew; something that he had probably known ever since he'd first met the guy in the D.C. High parking lot. So far, all he'd figured out was that Squall was a cutter, afraid of any kind of physical proximity and almost ridiculously self-conscious, for whatever reasons. He didn't play well with others and was easily set off, but he was also sweet and adorable in his own, crude way. He never said or did anything without reason, yet he always seemed too afraid to speak what was _really_ on his mind.

It was almost like _something _was holding Squall back, keeping him from fully trusting another person, and Seifer was determined to figure out just what exactly it was.

'_I have time. A little while, anyway... until we graduate, I guess. Damn, one year suddenly doesn't seem all that long anymore. I wonder what he's gonna do after high school. I bet he's got straight A's... he's probably gonna go straight to college. Smart little fucker. Maybe he'll study art or somethin'. He'd be a fool not to. I should find out which school he wants to go to and sign my ass up. Ah, whatever... I'll find out what his plans are eventually, I guess. Patience pretty much seems to be the key here. Hmph. I'm kinda hungry now.'_

"Hey, can you hand me a sandwich please, cupcake?" Seifer asked, yawning lazily.

Squall started again, whisked from his own train of thoughts, then nodded almost hastily. He slipped his hand out of Seifer's and bent down, rummaging through the bulging plastic bag. Seifer couldn't help but smile softly when he saw just a flash of pale skin and a hint of the brunette's black boxer shorts between his shirt hem and jeans as he bent forward. He seemed engrossed in the task of fumbling with the bag, and he was muttering quietly to himself.

'_He's so fuckin' cute...'_

Squall re-emerged with a carefully wrapped ham and cheese sandwich, which he thrust into Seifer's extended hand with a low-pitched grunt.

"Anything else? You want something to drink?" the seventeen year old asked, still fishing around in the bag.

"Not right now," Seifer replied vaguely, still gazing at Squall's backside with all the _wrong_ thoughts going through his mind. "Maybe later... thanks."

"Sure..."

Squall straightened up once more, blinking in surprise at the strange, rapturous glow that lit up Seifer's face as the blond was giving him a blatant stare, sandwich in hand and eyes entirely clouded over in awe. With a scowl and an annoyed tilt to his head, Squall asked snappily, "What?"

The blond only smiled at him distantly.

"What the hell? Stop staring at me like I'm some fucking billboard, dammit," Squall bit acridly, sounding irritable. "... Why are you looking at me like that?"

'_... Because I love you.'_

Seifer abruptly turned his head, his face a pained grimace as the genuineness and depth of his feelings finally struck him with the same bruising power of a _sledgehammer_. For a moment, his whole body was tensing so violently that everything just seemed to shut down and he could hardly even breathe. It felt like a cramp in the left side of his chest, but infinitely worse than a mere _cramp_ at the same time. It almost felt like someone had stabbed him with a knife – over and over and _over _again, till every heartbeat was stinging in his chest and the pain was so _excruciating _that he just wanted it to stop and turn into numbness before it would drive him completely insane.

It was the very first time he ever unknowingly found out exactly how _Squall_ felt every single, painful day.

'_Is it really supposed to hurt this much...?'_

Seifer didn't know the answer to that question, and he wondered whether he ever would. He had nothing to compare this experience to, and he was scared that Squall would never feel the same way as he did. The thought was nauseating, and his face fell. He knew Squall was still watching him expectantly, but he couldn't give the brunette the answer he was so impatiently waiting for – not right then, not right there. Not _yet_. He didn't want to scare Squall by moving too far too fast, but he didn't want to lie, either, so he bit down his feelings like he had done before, denying himself what he truly wanted to say and do.

He felt like crying at that moment.

Squall could tell that something was wrong, just by the expression on Seifer's face as he was blankly unwrapping his sandwich, but the brunette didn't dare to pry. For a brief second, the blond had looked as if he had wanted to say something very important, but in the end, he hadn't said anything at all. A part of Squall _wanted_ to ask and try to find out what was weighing on Seifer's shoulders, but when it came down to it, he was too scared to simply open his mouth and do it.

Thus, Squall faked another emotionless smile, shifted in his seat and crossed his hands in his lap to silently look out the window.

'_Who am I to pester him about what's on his mind, anyway? It's none of my business. Seifer can deal with it, I'm sure. Even if something's bothering him, there's nothing **I** can do, anyway. I'm not his damned boyfriend or anything like that. Maybe I'm not even his**friend**. What am I to him? What is he to me? ... I have no idea. I'm not even sure I want to know. ... Whatever, I guess.'_

"... You're not eating anything?" Seifer asked several minutes later, after he had already scarfed down his own sandwich and tossed the wrapper carelessly to the floor. "Squall?"

The brunette shook his head, subconsciously studying Seifer's profile from the corner of his eyes – checking if any of the strange dullness had yielded from the blond's handsome face. Seifer did seem a bit more pulled together than before, although less ecstatic than he had during the beginning of their trip.

'_Looking at Seifer feels **weird**... as if someone's stepping on my chest. It... really fucking hurts... Why is it—'_

"Squall?"

Distracted, the dark haired teen re-focused his slate blue eyes on the other boy and snapped, "What?"

"... Can I see your hand?"

"..."

Seifer slowly motioned with his chin towards the console between them, where he had rested his own right hand, palm up, on the leather surface. Swallowing harder than usually, Squall glanced from those bronzed fingers to Seifer's eyes, which looked upon him both insistently and patiently at the same time.

Squall cut his eyes back to the other boy's hand, the line of his mouth grim but his gaze unsure. He knew he could say no. He knew he could flip Seifer off, say something rude and pretend the blond was just annoying the piss out of him. He could do all that, and Seifer would forgive him – the blond would take his rudeness, maybe laugh at it or tease him for it, but he would _take_ it, just like he always did. It would be so fucking easy.

And yet...

He could hear the blood pounding through his veins as he gradually lifted his left hand, his fingers splayed ever so slightly. He figured that his ears shouldn't have been ringing so much and that his throat shouldn't have been so tight, but he accepted the strange sensations for what they were, because he couldn't have suppressed them, anyway. By the time he had placed his hand loosely in Seifer's open palm, his skin had formed goose bumps and he was shivering once more, but he found that the feeling of the blond's warm skin against his own immediately calmed his nerves.

With a grateful smile, Seifer turned his hand over so it rested on top of Squall's rather than beneath it, and he gave the brunette a long, sure squeeze. Perhaps he had no idea how difficult of a step this had truly been for Squall, but he certainly understood that it had been taken neither easily nor lightly.

Sighing quietly, Squall slid a little lower in his seat and resumed watching the scenery. They were ascending at a rapid pace now, and judging by the familiar landmarks, Squall figured that they had reached an elevation of about 10,000 feet. He could definitely feel the difference; his ears were popping from the change in pressure. He found it kind of annoying.

After about fifteen minutes that they spent in comfortable silence, Squall was stirred from his comfortable daze when Seifer suddenly made an odd noise and gulped out his name.

"Uhh... Squall...?"

The brunette's head streaked to the left, and he let out a small sound of surprise when he saw Seifer's face. The blond's skin had paled several shades since Squall had last given him a thorough look-over, and it had an almost greenish tinge to it. To his concern, he noted many tiny beads of sweat spangled along Seifer's hairline and forehead. His hand seemed to be shaking slightly, and he kept licking his lips with the tip of his tongue as if in distress.

"What's up with _you_?" Squall asked incredulously, glancing from Seifer's quivering right hand, which was still resting on top of his own, back to the blond's queasy looking face.

"I... I'm not sure," Seifer answered hesitantly, his voice rasping as his Adams apple bopped and he swallowed. "I, uh... feel _really _fuckin' sick all of a sudden... Urgh..."

"You gonna _barf_?" the brunette across from him quipped, sounding cutely stunned.

"Shit... I just might..."

Squall raised a brow, not really willing to believe what he saw. Then, he noticed that Seifer was swerving to the left and right in their lane, apparently having a hard time driving straight.

"Hey, seriously, what's _wrong_?" Squall demanded more inquisitively now. "You're all over the fucking road!"

Seifer hastily removed his hand from Squall's and grasped the steering wheel more tightly, pressing his lips together in concentration. Squall leaned over to him, thumbing the visor of his hat upwards to be able to look Seifer straight in the face.

"What's wrong?" he repeated, his voice sharp and firm, leaving no more room for excuses.

"I... I dunno..." the eighteen year old groaned wearily. "I'm feeling really sick to my stomach and kinda dizzy... _Fuck_... and my head hurts..."

For a few moments, Squall simply stared at the blond, thinking quietly. Seifer ran his forearm across his face, drawing a long breath through his nose. Truthfully, he looked like he was about to pass out.

"I'll be okay," Seifer muttered weakly. "Must've been the stupid sandwich from Ward's... Yurgh... I'll _kill_ that fucker Raijin... dammit..."

Squall gazed at the pale blond as Seifer took another deep, pointedly hitched breath, desperately trying to fight down his sudden onset of weakness, and suddenly, out of nowhere, the brunette finally understood.

"... Pull over."

Seifer turned to him and blinked, slowly and confused. "What?"

"I said, pull _over_," Squall commanded in a hard tone that was tinted with impatience, and he was already undoing his seatbelt. "I'll drive."

"No, I'll be okay... don't worry," Seifer repeated. "Really... I can drive..."

"No, you can't. Not like this. Pull over!"

"But—"

"Look," Squall snarled, narrowing his eyes. "Stop arguing and pull the fuck _over_!"

"Fine... Alright... I'll do it..."

With a sigh of both relief and resignation, Seifer finally pulled to the side of the narrow road and shakily shifted into neutral. Unsure, he watched how Squall opened his door and lightly leapt to the ground, quickly circling the truck and re-emerging on the driver's side.

"Get out," Squall ordered after he had yanked Seifer's door open and placed one hand on his right hip.

When the blond merely stared at him in wordless amazement, his face white as a sheet, Squall grunted in exasperation and reached across his lap to undo Seifer's seatbelt. Grabbing the older boy's arm, he wrenched Seifer out of the driver's cabin and shoved him towards the flame red hood.

"Get in the passenger's seat," he barked, giving Seifer a quick, impatient look as he motioned to the other side. "_Go_!"

"But—"

"Get a fucking move on, will you?"

"... Can you even drive a truck?"

Squall snorted cynically. "Don't be an idiot."

Swaying slightly, Seifer wobbled around the front of the truck on unsure legs and eventually heaved himself into the passenger seat, carefully monitored by Squall's wary, stone cold gaze. When Seifer settled into the seat, but forgot to close his door, the brunette let out an infuriated groan, hastily jogged across the pebbled road to the blond's side and slammed the door shut with a loud bang.

Honestly, Seifer was starting to feel like a complete retard.

'_Squall's acting really pissy all of a sudden ... Is he mad at me, or what...? Dammit, I wish I could help it... but I just feel like total **shit**... Urgh...'_

It looked indeed as if Squall was extremely angered over the blond's disheveled state. He was frowning sinisterly as he sat down, buckled up, closed his own door, haphazardly adjusted his seat and put the truck into gear to pull onto the narrow road and perform a very sharp (and very _dangerous_) u-turn.

"... We're going back down?" Seifer asked with a blank, boggled expression.

"Yeah," Squall answered curtly, blue eyes blazing in determination.

"Uh... look, really, I'm fine, I... maybe I just really need to hurl..." Seifer tried helplessly, ignoring the fierce lurching sensation in his stomach and the throbbing pain in the very frontal portion of his head. "Seriously. Spewing makes it all better..."

Squall pressed his lips together tightly.

"No," he bit.

"But, Squall—"

Sighing, Squall whisked his head to the right, and Seifer was stunned to see that his pissed off expression had smoothed out and was almost gentle now.

"Look, you've got mountain sickness, Seifer," the brunette explained, forcing a supposedly soothing smile on his face and ensuring to sound much calmer than he felt.

"_What_?" Seifer asked dubiously upon hearing the unfamiliar term.

"It has to do with the altitude... the oxygen deficit and difference in pressure up here compared to Deling City. Your body's not used to it and it looks like it's not adjusting well to the change. The only way you'll feel better is if we go back down."

"How can you know that's what I have?" a ridiculously pale-skinned Seifer asked, feeling even more dim-witted than before. "I've never even _heard_ of mountain sickness..."

Squall seemed to hesitate, before he murmured, "I know that that's what it is, because my Mom gets the same thing."

"... Really?"

"Yeah," Squall nodded, keeping his eyes on the road. "She can't stand the altitude up here at all. Anything beyond 8,000 feet is too much for her. She gets dizzy, a headache and really, _really _nauseous. A bad sandwich won't do that to you, at least not this quickly."

"Wait... So, you're tellin' me I got a... _chick_ _disease_?" Seifer gasped. "What the fuck... that's so _lame_. I can't believe I'm such a fuckin' pussy..."

Oddly touched by the blond's mortified tone of voice, Squall smiled forgivingly and said, "Don't worry about it. It's not a 'chick disease', alright? Even skilled climbers get mountain sickness. It's not your fault."

"... _You_ don't have it," Seifer clipped bitterly, pouting like a spoiled little kid who'd just found out that Christmas had been canceled.

"I've lived here longer than you have, remember? More red blood cells in my blood to carry oxygen and crap, whatever the fucking reason, I forgot," Squall sighed, his voice slipping irritably. "Just get over it, alright."

"What about our trip?" Seifer asked, rubbing his aching temples with a stifled grunt of misery. "Shit, man, I fucked it all up... I can't believe it. I've been looking forward to this all _week_, dammit!"

"... I'll take you to the reservoir if you feel better when we get there," Squall offered after a moment of hesitation, frowning thoughtfully. "It's further down the mountain. You might do alright there. We'll have to see."

"Oh, yeah... let's do that... Damn, I'm sorry, kitten... I really... uh..."

"Shut up and stop whining, okay?" the brunette commanded, feigning annoyance but sounding uncharacteristically kind. "I never knew you were such a fucking _pansy_, jeez. I said it's fine."

Seifer gave him an unsure, lowbrow stare that looked nothing short of pathetic. "You sure it is...?"

Grimacing, Squall stuck his tongue through his teeth and playfully flipped the blond the bird.

"I wouldn't say it if I _wasn't_ sure, okay?" he growled.

Seifer tried a grin, although the gesture looked painful in itself. "Okay..."

From the corners of his watchful eyes, Squall discreetly studied Seifer as he rested his head against the frame of the open window. The blond heaved a long, pitiful sigh and his face twisted with the nausea raging on his insides. As much as he hated the basic concept of it, Squall actually found himself feeling truly sorry for his classmate. Seifer had never struck him as the delicate type, so he had to be hurting pretty badly to complain this much. It reminded him of the trip he had taken with his mother once, right after he had turned sixteen and gotten his driver's license.

He wished he had never taken her to the mountains with him, and there was a definite familiarity to that feeling now.

'_She was throwing up for almost **three **hours... I had no idea what to do, I was so worried. Neither of us knew about this whole mountain sickness shit until the doctor told her. Kato was pissed. I kind of wonder why... not like he ever cared much about either of us to begin with.'_

The memory immediately conjured up a hideous array of emotions that he really didn't wish to be dealing with right then – or _ever_, for that matter. The thought of Kato and his mother stung, because he knew that Raine would die of agony if she ever found out just how completely sick and twisted her husband really was. He was good at pretending to be the doting, loyal husband and making her happy, at least on the outside, Squall had to give him that, but it was all he would ever accredit the bastard with.

He frowned, glaring at the pebble-covered road without really seeing it. Time... time, resilience and determination were all that he needed at this point. Time to become a man, strong and dependable, because the very moment he'd be able to financially support his mother and sister on his own, Squall would make sure they'd _never _see Kato's face again.

'_I **hate **him. I hate him so fucking much. Why can't she be happy? Why? She's never done anything wrong, but all the men she's ever been with fucked her over, either openly or behind her back. She doesn't deserve this. I just want her to be happy... **truly**, genuinely happy. **Not** this kind of fucked up happiness she's stuck with right now. 'Cause... if it wasn't for her... I... I would have never... been...'_

"Squall..."

"What?" he snapped instinctively, his tone sharper than intended and the open hostility in it certainly not directed towards the blond sitting by his side.

Seifer was gazing back at him for several long seconds, a strange look in his eyes, before his face set and those emerald orbs looked as cool as ever as he turned his head aside.

"... Nothing."

It wasn't the kind of response Squall would have expected from the eighteen year old, but for the moment, it suited him just fine. He was feeling irritated; not at Seifer, per se, but at himself and his inability to rule Kato out of his head.

In the end, the man's physical and emotional torture was holding much more affliction over him than he'd ever fully comprehend or admit.

Leaning back in his seat almost defiantly, Squall tightened his grip on the steering wheel and consciously attempted to concentrate on the road ahead.

"... Will it go away?"

Squall mentally staggered at the question, which had been uttered from his right, embedded with a hint of uncertainty. Glancing towards his companion, he asked, "What?"

Seifer performed an impatient gesture with his hand. He looked to be feeling better, albeit still much paler than was normal for him. Sounding frustrated, the blond explained, "The mountain sickness. Will it go away?"

Without hesitation, Squall nodded.

"Once we get down in elevation, yeah. You'll be fine."

"That's not what I meant," Seifer interrupted, suddenly staring out of the windshield with grim passion. "I meant, over time... you think I'll ever be able to go up on the Alclad with you without wanting to puke my guts out?"

Squall stared at the blond quizzically, and Seifer was reciprocating his gaze stoically. There was something in his eyes that Squall couldn't explain, but it caused his face to heat.

"I don't know for sure, but yeah... I think so," he replied, insecurity creeping into his voice as he carefully chose his words. "I think it should work, some day..."

"... Thanks, Squall."

The brunette was taken aback by the raw sincerity swaying in Seifer's response. With a quirk of his eyebrow, he asked, "For what?"

This time, Seifer merely smiled at him – a genuine, beautiful smile that looked so damned intense that it burned. Before he knew or could help it, Squall felt his skin flush even more. Immediately, he trained his eyes on the road and stuttered, "Uh... we'll be at the reservoir in a few minutes."

"Alright."

Seifer leaned slack against the open window again, letting his right arm dangle outside and sticking his nose into the wind. As they descended the mountain road, Squall kept throwing him probing glances, relieved to see that Seifer's skin color was improving and he wasn't whining nearly as much. When Cosmo Canyon finally came into sight, all pretty and blue and dazzling and whatnot, he decided to ask a question he had never bothered to ask anyone besides his mother and sister throughout his entire life.

"... How are you feeling?"

"Better," Seifer declared, and neither his tone nor expression gave away just how warm and fuzzy Squall's concern for his well-being made him feel. "Let's stop at the lake."

"You sure?"

"Yeah," the older youth nodded. "I want to. I'll be fine."

And thus, Squall complied with Seifer's request and carefully pulled onto the side road that cut across the rocky fields towards Cosmo Canyon. It was a rough ride, to say the least. The road was bumpy and littered with potholes, and Squall heard Seifer making disconcerting little squelching noises more than just once.

"Don't puke," the brunette ordered stiffly, yanking his head around to shoot Seifer an imposing glare.

Rolling his eyes, Seifer retorted jokingly, "Jeez, I'll do what I can, mein Fuehrer."

Squall grunted abjectly at the tasteless expression. "... Whatever."

They pulled into a parking lot that was near the waterfront, and the brunette thoughtfully picked a spot in the generous shade of a tree. He only saw two other cars and one RV parked alongside them, and there were absolutely no people in sight.

"For this to be a reservoir, it's pretty fuckin' deserted," Seifer noted. "Where is everyone?"

"Not sure. These people are probably out there fishing or something. Who knows."

"Have you ever fished?"

Squall let out a snort of disgust. "Like hell."

"Yeah, didn't think so. You'd never catch a thing. Fuckin' fish must be scared _shitless _when they see you."

"Stop being a dipshit and get out already."

Turning off the engine, Squall opened his door and slowly slid out of his seat. The coarse gravel of the parking lot crunched beneath his boots as he turned around and cast a quick look at the reservoir. The water was sparkling in the sunshine, its surface stirred only by the gentle breeze and a few birds diving for fish. Old trees, fallen logs, massive boulders and thick bushes lined the sandy beach, and the grass was tall and green, smelling faintly of herbs and leaves.

'_... I guess it is sort of nice.'_

Squall didn't continue to watch the serene scenery and faced Seifer instead. The blond had finally gotten out of the vehicle and staggered around the hood to stand next to Squall. Looking down upon the brunette, he smiled wryly and said, "Pretty, huh?"

His opposite shrugged evasively and started to head for the water, motioning him to follow. Naturally, Seifer knew better than to object.

They trudged across the parking lot and through the grass that was so tall that it reached past Seifer's knees. Frogs and crickets were noisily acknowledging their presence, but as Squall was about to continue on his way towards the waterfront, Seifer suddenly poked him in the shoulder and pointed to their right at some thick, stranded log a little ways off in the distance. It was strung on the ground in the midst of several leafy trees, almost hidden in the grassland.

"Hey, let's sit over there for a bit," the blond suggested, already making a beeline for the shady little spot. "Come on."

Squall frowned at him, but said nothing. Truthfully, he didn't care where they went, but he hated to be bossed around. The only reason he bit back a snappy remark was the simple fact that he was secretly relieved over the apparent improvement in Seifer's condition.

All in all, he had felt really fucking bad about it.

'_I should've known better than to let him come up here without asking him about getting mountain sickness first. Not that he would've known, I guess... but still... I should have at least bothered to ask, or paid better attention.'_

With a sigh, Seifer flopped down on the ground, square on his ass, pushing aside the grass to rest his back against the tree and look up expectantly at Squall, who was looking around like a lost puppy.

"Sit down," Seifer ordered, hitching a sweet grin on his face as he propped up his legs and patted the earth next to him.

Squall looked reluctant, but he seemed to realize that refusing Seifer's request would get him nowhere at this point. His eyes narrowed slightly and he started to chew on his bottom lip, but after a brief moment of hesitation, he finally swallowed his pride and sat down on Seifer's right.

Looking content, the blond reclined his head against the sturdy wood and rolled onto his side to be able to catch a better view of his companion. He noticed how tense and on edge the dark haired boy looked as his eyes were swiping erratic looks around their beautiful environment, but he figured that his discomfort would evaporate over time.

"Thanks," Seifer finally drawled, "This ismuch better, man, I tell ya."

He was still rubbing his temples, though mostly because he took great delight in the sympathetic expression on Squall's pretty face. The boy had one knee drawn to his chest, hugging it with his arms, while the other was stretched out before him and his baseball hat was tugged low into his face. Squall was resting his chin on his knee, looking mostly at peace, but also as if something was bothering him. When the brunette finally tilted his head to give his friend a curt, irresolute look out of spellbinding blue-grey eyes, Seifer chuckled softly and reached up to run the knuckles of his right hand down Squall's cheek.

"What's wrong?" he asked, not at all surprised when Squall turned his face away from the touch.

"Nothing."

"You've never been able to fool me with that bullshit, so why do you still try?"

"_Nothing's _wrong," Squall bit back irritably. "Can't you just sit there and shut your face for five fucking minutes?"

"Mhh, well, I suppose I could do that. But then again..." the blond leered slyly, before he suddenly rotated his body with the deadly speed and agility of a feral cat. Without warning, he pushed down Squall's knee with one hand and shifted across the brunette's legs, practically straddling him. He placed his hands on the right and left of Squall's head, gripping the coarse wood, and he smirked down upon the boy, who suddenly looked very taken aback.

"The _hell_ do you think you're doing?" Squall pressed, furrowing his brows.

"Getting my mind off this mountain sickness crap?" Seifer retorted, lowering his head. He ignored the threatening glare in Squall's flashing eyes, as well as the pale hand that wrenched into his shirt and attempted to push him away.

"Cut it out," Squall growled huskily when Seifer breathed down the nape of his neck and placed a demanding, open-mouthed kiss right below his left ear, nipping at the tender jugular and feeling the strong pulse pounding beneath the skin.

"Why? I find this pretty distracting..." he crooned.

"We're in _public_, asshole! Have you no fucking _decency_?"

"Not really," Seifer snorted, sounding amused. "Besides, what 'public' are you referring to here, anyway? I haven't seen anyone for miles, and neither have you."

"I thought you were feeling sick," Squall snapped, sending a burning death-glare past the visor of his hat at those damned hypnotic green eyes that were situated only inches from his own, glittering playfully.

"Well, what can I say, your body's like a fuckin' miracle cure, cupcake," Seifer purred, chuckling under his breath.

Squall shifted jerkily, trying to move away. "Don't make fun of me, asshole!"

"Why do you always think I'm making fun of you?" the blond sighed as he pushed his knees firmly against both sides of Squall's thighs, thus keeping him from moving around too much without actually placing any of his weight on those tightly muscled limbs. "If anything, I'm trying to _make out_ with you here. Seriously - you feel good, I can _make_ you feel good, what's the point in being difficult about it?"

"Fuck you."

"... Are you running out of excuses?"

"I don't _need_ excuses!"

Squall tried to turn away like the stubborn guy that he was, but Seifer caught his chin with one open hand and gently forced the brunette to straighten up and look at him. A lesser man would've likely winced under the diamond hard glare that seared through him with the cutting power of a thousand scalpels, but Seifer only cambered his lips into a cocky smirk.

"Son of a—"

Seifer swallowed the rest of the insult, instantly feeling Squall stiffening beneath the suddenness of his kiss. With one hand, he continued to steady the brunette's chin by the jaw line, with the other, he pulled Squall away from the log and against his chest, still hovering in a kneeling position above the younger boy's legs. Naturally, their hips ground together as Seifer finally lowered his own body and continued to lift the brunette's torso, and Squall instinctively bucked away from the touch, searching for a way out.

He never got very far.

Seifer kissed like Squall glared – hard, sure and intimidating. He had been wanting to do this all week, but had found no opportunity to just grind the brunette into him and devour every inch of his pale white skin, kissing it until it would turn bright scarlet. Squall felt ridiculously hot and tempting in his arms now, so close and _accessible,_ but all the same, Seifer knew better than to stretch his luck too thin. He had noticed Squall ascending new levels of tension in his arms, and although the brunette wasn't precisely offering any resistance and had actually gone from permitting the kiss to actively _participating_, Seifer was aware that this could very well change any given second.

Taking Squall now would have been far too easy, anyway.

Still engaged in their fierce lip lock, Seifer blindly reached up and pulled the cap from Squall's head, dropping it into the grass. He tilted the brunette backwards against the log again, and although Squall wasn't exactly putty in his hands, the younger boy incrementally allowed his body to follow Seifer's manual guidance. Although he hated to admit it, Squall could tell that Seifer knew precisely what he was doing, but he didn't want to explore the possible reasons for the blond's sexual experience.

'_Damn him for being such a fucking **jock**... What am I to him, anyway? Just another record in his little black book? Shit...'_

When Seifer interrupted their kiss, he almost couldn't breathe at the sight of Squall laying beneath him, perched against the fallen tree, his head held up by defiance rather than voluntary muscle control. Squall's face was an excuse all in itself – one for Seifer to reach down and rake the mussed up dark brown hair behind the brunette's ears with both hands to get a better view. He noted the tightening of Squall's jaw and that rushed, hunted spark in his eyes, veiled by long black lashes and a dangerously narrow glare. The brunette wasn't touching him; he had placed his hands on the ground, clutching a few fistfuls of grass with a primal sort of intensity. Satisfied, Seifer gave the brunette the old once-over, finding that Squall's breathing was distinctly more ragged than usual and that the heated streak of flush across his cheekbones was incredibly erotic.

'_He always pretends he doesn't want it, but his body's one pathetic liar. I can feel his legs fuckin' quivering and his skin's getting so damn hot... dammit, I wanna fuck him so badly it hurts.'_

Letting out a strained breath, Seifer tried to exercise what little self-control he had left. He had unconsciously stemmed one hand next to Squall's head to allow himself to lean forward, while he had placed the other on the brunette's bony hip, gripping it tightly. His lips were almost touching Squall's face again, and he saw that the dark haired biker was staring at him still, his mouth rigid but reddened from their kiss.

'_Goddammit...'_

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Seifer figured that he probably should have jerked off that day. Resisting the lure that was Squall's eyes and Squall's skin and Squall's lips and Squall's hair and Squall's_hot fucking body_ was a daunting task on any given day, but right now he wanted the brunette so desperately that he could hardly form a concise thought. He had never, _ever_, felt such raw urgency in his entire life.

"... What the fuck? Did Selphie put a fucking _aphrodisiac _in your sandwich or what? Stop drooling all over my face, jackass!"

Leave it to Squall Leonhart to butcher the mood.

Seifer's right eyebrow twitched irritably, and just as he considered denying the drooling part of Squall's statement, he came to the conclusion that words were lost on this guy, anyway. With a snarl, he removed his hand from Squall's hip and clutched the nape of his neck instead, preparing the brunette for yet another fierce physical onslaught.

He slipped his tongue between Squall's upper and lower lip, feeling teeth that refused to part, at first. When Seifer sucked in that bottom lip though, biting it demandingly, Squall instinctively opened his mouth and let out a surprised groan, allowing Seifer's tongue entrance.

Seifer knew he was going too far when he shoved his hand underneath Squall's shirt and traced up and down the brunette's spine with his middle finger, smoothing it across sharp arches and hollows. Squall was little more than muscle and bones, with the only soft parts on him being his skin and hair, but damn, he was so fucking _hot_. Seifer consciously pressed his groin closer to the brunette's, and surprisingly, Squall didn't jerk until Seifer's experienced hand had already pushed into his jeans and boxer shorts, finding the very tip of his tailbone with one long, cocked digit.

Suddenly, the brunette's fists were no longer gripping the grass to wrestle it for support; instead, he slammed his clenched fists into Seifer's shoulders, his sole intent to thrust the blond as far away from him as he could.

"What are you _doing_?" he yelped out reflexively, panting as he recoiled as far as he could, shakily wiping his mouth with his hand. Out of haunted and nearly pitch black eyes, he glared at Seifer, and he spat a silent curse when he noticed that he hadn't been able to shove the teen very far away at all. The blond was still kneeling above him, but Seifer's hands were now resting on his own thighs rather than on Squall's body, and his gaze was distinctly more sober than before.

"Fuck," Squall whispered, trembling as he raked one hand through his hair, his eyes drifting off to the right.

'_Not again... shit...'_

"I'm sorry," Seifer said slowly, searching Squall's face. All blood seemed to have left it, and Seifer didn't like the sight at all.

"I got carried away," he continued, trying to sound calm. "Trust me, I didn't mean to scare you."

"Get off me!"

"I will, alright, just let me talk to you for a—"

"No, fuck that! Get the fuck off me _now_!"

Squall's voice was high pitched and cold, but shaky just beneath the surface. Holding the brunette's flaring gaze with his own unyielding green orbs, Seifer slowly moved aside and dropped into the grass next to Squall, not looking away even once.

"... Better?" he asked soothingly, not even a hint of sarcasm in his tone. Instead, there was a very aware gravity to his inflection, because he knew that Squall had almost completely freaked out on him _again_.

Squall bit his lips, and his brows lowered as he turned his head away. Finally, after what felt like several minutes spent in awkward silence, he performed a hasty, wordless nod.

"Squall."

Squall winced and stared at the lake, if only to avoid having to look at Seifer and acknowledge that he had just said his name in a voice as unbending as welded steel. Looking back at what had just happened, he wished that he could take back what he had done. He wished he could've just stayed calm and endured Seifer's touch instead of flipping over it, but something inside his head had simply snapped when he had felt the older blond's hand inside his pants, touching places he had no business to be touching. Of course, Seifer would want an explanation now, and Squall had no idea how to explain _anything_.

'_Shit... **shit**...'_

"Squall, look at me."

He hated it. He hated that his head turned and his eyes slid across trees and the distant blue sky, only to meet Seifer's intimidating gaze. Why was he _listening_ to the blond, and moreover, why was he submitting to his requests, which always sounded like fucking _orders_ more than anything else? Because deep down, he knew Seifer meant well? Because he _liked_ him? Because, truthfully, he had enjoyed nearly every damn second in Seifer's hypnotic presence, showered with volatile kisses and held in a crushing, yet comforting embrace?

_'Why? Why am I here?'_

Seifer was still looking at him, all frowns, stares and solemn patience. For a moment, Squall wished that the blond was kissing him again, if only because the intimate act was so much easier to bear than this strange look on Seifer's face.

'_He's upset 'cause I made him stop... because I freaked out. What was I supposed to do? I **know** he would never do anything unless I allowed it, but... still... he... ungh. Shit. Is this all my fault? Did I **let** him go this far? I guess that's what it is... Then what right do I have to even get pissed at him? I'm such an idiot.'_

"... What in the world happened to you, Squall?"

Squall had to keep his somewhat pulled-together expression from dropping when he heard Seifer asking that question, knowing that it stretched much further into the past than the last five minutes. They were sitting next to each other, Seifer's right knee touching his left thigh, the blond's hand somewhere on the log, behind his back, and Squall realized that his blond classmate was much, much closer to uncovering his secrets than he had _ever_ thought possible.

It scared him so goddamn much.

"What are you talking about?" he asked stiffly, feigning ignorance. "You just caught me by surprise, that's all. Give me some kind of warning next time, pervert."

Seifer wanted to believe every word of it, but deep down, he knew so much better than that. Whatever Squall was hiding from him was affecting every facet of his personality, but in the end, it seemed to affect his relationships with other people more so than anything else.

Something about Squall just wasn't the way it was supposed to be.

"That's not what I meant," Seifer growled softly, effectively discarding the brunette's cheap excuse. "I want to know what happened to you _before _I came along. Who the hell did this to you?"

"D-did what?" Squall stuttered, feeling his insides turn cold as the hairs on the back of his neck stood.

'_This is not good...'_

"I don't know, you tell me," Seifer said evenly, with a strangely pregnant intonation, while staring straight into Squall's eyes, trying to read them like a book.

The brunette let out an arrogant snort. "... What the fuck. You watch too much TV."

"Look, Squall, I've been around enough people in my life to know that no one acts like this without a _very_ good reason," Seifer retorted, a hint of impatience etched into his voice. "You must've gotten burned at some point in your life, and I wanna know when, how and by whom."

"You don't know me," Squall bristled, inching away just slightly. "You have no clue what you're talking about, alright!"

"Actually, I know you better than you might think."

And in the end, Seifer had summed up exactly what Squall was so deeply afraid of; the very thought of Seifer finding out the truth about Kato made him want to throw up, and in fact, his stomach was turning right there, in the grass, sitting against that mossy old tree that was nearly as heavy as Seifer's gaze on him. He could deal with his stepfather's physical assaults, or so he thought, but he couldn't handle the fear of anyone discovering the truth he had been hiding for so long.

It was probably the main reason why he had never let anyone close, trusting no one and believing in nothing at all.

Of course, at this point, Seifer was about as close to him as anyone could get, and Squall enjoyed the intimacy of it too much to push the blond out. Perhaps this incongruous will to keep Seifer around without _truly_ letting him in was the ultimate motivation for the strange answer that Squall finally gave to the blond's question... or perhaps it was just utter despair.

"... Aren."

Seifer blinked at that unexpected statement, which vaguely sounded like a male's name.

"What?" he asked dumbly.

"His name was Aren... Aren Collins," Squall repeated, citing the name of a school psychologist that one of his teachers had made him talk to during his tenth grade year. He couldn't really explain this choice, but he figured that it didn't make a difference. If Seifer wanted a name, then by all means, he would get one. The "when" and the "how"... well, he'd work on those.

"_Aren_?" Seifer repeated. "Aren Collins?"

"Yeah."

"Was he your boyfriend?"

Squall resisted the urge to flinch as Kato's image flared up in his mind, and he forced himself to nod indifferently. "Something like that, I guess."

"When did you date him?" Seifer asked, profoundly astonished that Squall was telling him this.

In a way, it didn't really make sense. In another, it was exactly what Seifer had always wanted to hear.

"When I was fifteen and in my sophomore year of high school," Squall answered, hoping he would remember these answers if Seifer would ever ask the same questions again.

This was only one of the many reasons he hated to lie - the upkeep was a fucking pain in the ass.

"Does he go to our school?"

"No, he's older than you and me... he was a freshman at college in Esthar back then. I don't know what he's doing now, and I couldn't care less, to tell you the truth."

"What, so he was like nineteen or twenty then? And you were _fifteen_?" Seifer pried, a shade of incredulity to his voice.

Squall had dated a college student? _Squall?_ A college student? Frat boy parties and drunk threesomes came to mind, and Seifer definitely didn't like those images in his head, nor did he find them very believable where Squall's frigid personality was concerned.

In any case, this was more than Seifer had ever expected from the seemingly virginal brunette's love life.

"Yeah," Squall nodded, absent-mindedly fiddling with his left wristband. "He was twenty."

"That's a hell of an age difference. I mean, you were like, barely out of your _diapers_. That dude was seriously robbing the cradle!"

Squall swallowed and faked a sneer.

'_You have no idea...'_

"Well, whatever makes your cookie crumble, I guess..." Seifer drawled, ignoring that tiny jab of jealousy in the left side of his chest. "So, what happened?"

Rattling his brain, Squall tried to think of all the relationship woes he had ever heard his Mom or other girls, like Selphie, complaining about. Of course, he couldn't drift too far into the realm of clichés, since Seifer wasn't a complete moron and would surely pick up on his game if he went completely overboard. So, when Squall started to speak again, he unconsciously weaved bits and pieces of his _true_ story into the one he had so swiftly made up, and it flowed much more easily than it should have.

"He lied to me. He cheated. He pretended to be so many things, and he didn't turn out to be any of them. He used me to get what he wanted... _everything _he wanted..." Squall explained bitterly, yanking out a few handfuls of grass and watching them be whisked from his sprawled fingers by the wind. "I met him when he was a senior at my high school and I was just a freshman. We kind of started... _dating_ after he left school. He'd come home during semester breaks and on long weekends, asking me to see him... although it was more like 'making' me see him rather than 'asking' me to. In the end, he tried to make me give up everything I wanted to do only to spend time with him."

"Sounds like one _possessive _son of a bitch."

"Not really," Squall said, smiling a hollow smile. "Honestly, he didn't give a fuck about me or spending time together, he just got a kick out of exercising the power he had over me. I was _nothing_ to him but a dumb little kid he could boss around. He loved having that kind of control over other people. My feelings didn't matter one fucking bit. I looked up to him, and at first, he was nice to me... but after a while, all of that changed. He'd threaten to destroy everything I cared for if I didn't do exactly _what_ he wanted and _when_ he wanted it. I pretty much let him walk all over me, because I was stupid and I didn't know any better. I... I didn't know what else to do. Nothing I did was ever good enough for him – _I _wasn't good enough. He fucked with me until I couldn't take it anymore. When I told him I never wanted to see his fucking face again, he just laughed at me and said that I was pathetic and that he _owned_ me... that there was no way I could possibly survive without him. He was wrong. I walked away, I never _did_ see his face again, and I _was_ fine. But... still... _everything _changed."

Squall suddenly choked as his reality and lies intertwined, becoming one and the same story of grief, anger and despair. The name and face of Squall's torturer might have been very different, but the pain was identical. He performed a vague gesture with his hand, but when he realized that his arm was trembling, he quickly dropped his hand into his lap. Tears had welled up in his eyes, and he tried to swallow them by tilting his head back and staring into the blazing blue sky.

It was the rawness of Squall's emotions and the hurt in his face that made Seifer fall for his lies. Stretching out his hand, he cupped Squall's chin and gently turned his face towards his own.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, sounding impossibly sincere.

Squall shrugged jerkily, but the abrupt motion only caused his tears to fall. With a muffled groan, he rubbed the heel of his hand across his cheek and downcast his eyes in shame.

He couldn't believe how much a false piece of reality could _hurt_.

When Seifer eventually reached for his left wrist and gazed at it silently, running one finger along the thick leather band with a dark grimace on his face, Squall could predict the blond's next question before it had even been uttered.

"Is _he _the reason you're doing this to yourself?"

Chuckling sadly, Squall shook his head. "It's more complicated than that..."

Seifer frowned at him. "How?"

"I don't know," the brunette sighed weakly, suddenly sounding so incredibly tired and worn out. "Don't ask."

Despite his stern disapproval of Squall's cutting habit, Seifer forced himself to honor the brunette's request, at least for the moment being, but there was something else that weighed heavily on his mind.

"Squall... did you sleep with him?" the blond murmured hesitantly, running his thumb along Squall's jaw line with a grim, but caring smile that masked the uncertainty beneath. He wasn't even sure if he should be asking this, but there was a part of him that simply had to know.

Squall's face blanched as the last remaining color drained from it, but after he spent a minute in thoughtful consideration and waging his options (as well as their possible consequences), he slowly nodded.

"Yeah... I did..."

The blond's expression hardened.

"Did you want it?" he asked stonily. "Or did _he_ want it...?"

Squall knew too fucking agonizingly well what Seifer was implying, but that was a part of his sad tale that the brunette would never be able to openly admit to anyone, not even behind the façade of a made-up storyline and an imagined antagonist.

"... It was mutual," he muttered, avoiding Seifer's eyes.

"_Was _it?" the blond inquired pointedly, cocking his brows.

"Yeah," Squall hissed coarsely. "Although that doesn't mean that I don't regret it now."

"Why?"

The question seemed to catch Squall off guard, but the brunette caught himself quickly.

"What do you mean, '_why'_?" he asked stiffly.

"Why do you regret it? I know he was a motherfuckin' _bitch_, but if it was mutual you shouldn't have anything to regret."

Squall bit his lip. "I have my reasons."

"I'm sure that you do," Seifer agreed darkly. "Obviously, or else you wouldn't be so scared of being touched now."

"... It's not like that."

"Like what?"

"Whatever you're suggesting... it's not like that."

"I'm not suggesting anything," the blond stated, his eyes coldly intense. "I'm trying to figure out why everything I do that even _remotely_ suggests sex triggers your defense mechanisms to go haywire."

Squall swallowed and looked away, a strangely empty look on his face.

"... It's not your fault," the brunette murmured quietly.

"Then whose fault is it?"

There was that pained, almost hunted gleam in Squall's smoke blue eyes again, and Seifer could see him writhing under his intent gaze. He knew he had to be careful, because these were dangerous grounds he was treading on. Still, he had to know what was going on. He _had_ to. This was no longer a matter of superficial, boyish interest. Something about this was more serious than anything in his life ever had been.

"He..." Squall started, then paused. "He was never very... considerate... in _any _aspect..."

"Did he hurt you?" Seifer asked, before reconsidering. "Never mind. That was a stupid question."

"... I'm over it."

"Bullshit, Squall."

"Look, I'm not the first person this has ever happened to, okay?" Squall groaned, suddenly sounding spiteful and annoyed. "It's called _life_. Shit happens. In the end, everyone bleeds the same, anyway."

"Maybe, but you're the only person this has ever happened to who matters to me," Seifer declared dryly. "Besides, I have the feeling you bleed _very _differently from anyone else I've ever known."

Squall let out a derisive snort. "Whatever."

"... Did he ever force you to do it?"

"What?" Squall growled, frowning as he understood the question. "No. Not once."

"Okay. Because I don't call that sex. I call that something very different."

"Everything is '_very different_' when it comes to you, isn't it?" Squall snapped, and he found himself getting incredibly furious for no palpable reason. He wanted to yell and hit Seifer, if only because he was more easily accessible than Kato. "I _wanted _to sleep with him, and I did! It was a mistake, and I'm not stupid enough to repeat it! End of fucking story!"

Again, there was that sharp jab of jealousy, and Seifer could feel it getting _much _stronger than before. The thought of Squall sleeping with someone else brought his blood to a boil, and he wasn't even sure why. Honestly, considering his own somewhat_promiscuous _past, he had no reason to be jealous, but the feeling was _there_, whether it was reasonable or not.

Of course, he hated the idea of having to pay for the hideous mistakes that someone else had made before him, but considering that he was head over fucking heels for this ornery guy, he realized that there was just no means around it. Whatever damage that dick bag named Aren had caused would take time and patience to repair, as well as someone strong and willing enough to take on the job, and there was absolutely no way in _hell_ that Seifer would surrender this task to anyone else.

Feeling slightly depressed, Seifer curled his right arm around Squall's shoulders and brought the brunette against him with a sigh. The fact that Squall didn't resist and willingly nuzzled into the half-hug made up for a lot of the frustrating things that Seifer had just been told. For some reason, he'd always figured that he'd be Squall's first when it came to pretty much _anything _related to romance, and it irritated him that this wasn't the case.

'_Fuck... I can't believe I'm actually **jealous**. I've never been jealous in my whole fucking life! Not over something like this, anyway. Shit... what did he mean by not repeating that mistake again, anyway? Not ever sleeping with anyone again? Jeez, it sounds like something the ice princess would decide. Hmph. All the more reason to show him just how fucking **amazing **it can feel. He's got no idea what he's in for. Rest assured, I'll make sure he'll enjoy it. That dickhead Aren is gonna be a thing of the fuckin' past so quickly like you wouldn't believe. Now, I just have to get him to let down his guard long enough...'_

Squall, meanwhile, had very mixed feelings about his false 'revelations.' Partly, he was relieved that Seifer had bought into his bullshit, but he felt unbelievably guilty and ashamed at the same time. There were few things he hated more than lying to others, and while he realized that he couldn't be completely honest with Seifer without putting himself and the loyalty to his family on the line, he almost regretted making up his sob story about a boyfriend he had never even had.

Besides... some lies had a nasty habit of becoming impossible to keep up with over time. He was afraid that this would be one of them.

"Thank you," Seifer suddenly whispered into his ear as he casually played with Squall's hair, stroking the brunette's right temple with his hand.

"For what?" Squall asked quietly.

"For telling me what happened... for _trusting_ me, for once. I know it wasn't easy, believe me."

When Seifer craned his neck to look at Squall's face, he misinterpreted the dejected and almost wounded shimmer he found in the brunette's eyes and quickly assured him, "Hey... I'd _never _do anything like that bastard did to you, okay? You're too fucking important to me, Squall. I'll make you happy, and I'll make you feel good. You just have to _let _me."

Squall tried a thankful smile, but failed pathetically. He slowly started to feel more and more like the biggest asshole of the universe.

'_Shit... what was I thinking? I can't believe I told him all that and actually made him believe it. I guess the story wasn't **totally** made up, but still... I lied to him. I tell him not to fuck with my mind, only to turn right around and do the same thing to him. I'm such an**ass**. What the hell is wrong with me?'_

He scowled at his hands in his lap, giving them a sinister stare. Involuntarily, he wondered if he'd be wearing those wristbands if he had met Seifer three years ago, or seven years ago, or never at all.

It was probably pointless to wonder.

'_Seifer doesn't have a single scar on his body, as far as I've seen... only that tattoo. I'd never get a tattoo, and he'd probably never cut himself intentionally. Maybe, in some way, we're not so different after all...'_

"... Squall, will you go to the Homecoming Dance with me?"

'_What—'_

Looking as if someone had just beat him over the head with a frying pan, Squall shifted in Seifer's embrace and let out an entirely baffled, "_—the hell?_"

Seifer grinned cheerfully, looking like his usual light-hearted self once again. "Homecoming - will you go with me?"

The brunette cast him a wary, slack-jawed look. "... You're fucking _kidding_."

"Nope," Seifer insisted, shaking his head. "I'm dead serious, alright? I want you to go to the dance with me... as my date."

Squall raised his eyebrows in disbelief, just _knowing_ that this had to be a _joke_.

"The elevation's fucked with your brain more than I thought," he whistled, tilting his head almost cutely as he sneered at the blond in amusement.

"Hey, I'm _serious_, alright!" Seifer barked in mock outrage, clutching his chest with one hand. "Jeez, talk about trampling around on a guy's feelings... I'm hurt, Squall."

"You _can't_ be serious."

"I just _told_ you I was! Twice, in fact! Have you gone deaf on me or something?"

Squall frowned, still absolutely perplexed over the blond's request. "Why the _hell_ would you ask _me_ to be your date?"

This elicited a momentary vacant stare from Seifer, before the blond eventually heaved a loud sigh of resignation. Dumping his forehead into his hand, he groaned, "I can't believe you sometimes."

"What? _Why_?" Squall snapped angrily.

"I wonder if _anything_ I say to you ever gets absorbed by that stubborn ass brain of yours. What the hell's wrong with it anyway?" Seifer clipped sarcastically, lifting Squall's chin with his left index finger to examine his skull with great interest. Of course, the brunette snorted at him in loathing and hastily whisked his head to the side.

"Very funny, asshole," he hissed through ground teeth. "Whatever. I don't have time for your bullshit."

He pulled his legs close and shook Seifer's arm off his shoulders, preparing to get up and walk away. He felt vulnerable and oddly hurt, not really understanding why. Bringing the blond to this lake and talking to him suddenly seemed like such a stupid idea.

"Hey, wait!"

Squall felt a strong hand latching onto his forearm, and although he wanted to slap it away, he couldn't bring himself to do it. Seifer tugged him back down onto the ground forcefully, pulling him closer this time than before. Squall's head snapped around, and he opened his mouth to spew some kind of spiteful insult into the blond's face, but he found himself silenced by Seifer's collarbone.

Seifer had pulled him close indeed; with one hand placed on the back of Squall's head and the other still clutching his forearm, he was keeping him in his arms. He heard Squall letting out some random curse, muffled by his shirt, and he felt the brunette's right hand clawing at his shoulder to push him away. He could sense that the situation was about to escalate, _again_, and that was when he decided that it was enough.

"You _are_ good enough, Squall," he pressed, his voice shaky, but intensely sincere. "Fuck, you're so much _more_ than good enough."

Instantly, Squall went still in his embrace. He no longer moved, talked, nor _breathed_. Instead, a shiver ran through his body, causing Seifer to hold him even more tightly.

"Whatever anyone else has told you, or however they made you feel, they were _wrong_, understand?" Seifer continued sharply. "Totally, _entirely _fuckin' wrong. Being with you is a fuckin' privilege, and I feel like the luckiest son of a bitch for even being out here with you, sitting against this stupid log. Do you have the slightest fuckin' idea just how special you are? Anyone dumb enough to just give you up is a fuckin' _retard_."

"..."

"I _know _you think I'm just playing with you, and I understand where you're coming from, but fuck, let me prove you wrong, _goddammit_! You've gotta start trusting _someone_, and it might as well be me! Come on, give me a chance here!"

"..."

"You wanna know why I want you to go to that dance with me?"

Wanting to look Squall in the eyes and giving him no excuse to hide his face any longer, Seifer eased them apart and gave the brunette a glare out of orbs so dark, scorching and green that they looked like viridian hellfire. Squall seemed to have trouble withstanding that gaze, but he forced himself not to look down, if only because of his childish, defiant pride.

"I want to take you to that dance, because I wanna make you feel good, and because I want you to have _fun_... and because there's no one else I'd rather go with."

Squall stared, not knowing how to respond to Seifer's touching statement. The guilt he had been feeling was flaring up even stronger than before, nearly consuming him. He could feel his initial resistance being torn asunder by that terrible sensation of remorse over lying to the blond, and of course, Seifer sensed it, too. He had sensed it all along, and truthfully, it had been the opening he had been waiting for ever since that day that Irvine had told him about the dance.

"Why, though...?" Squall asked quietly, and his gaze flickered to the right to some unimportant focal point in the distance. "I'm not a _girl_, Seifer."

The blond let out a snort of laughter.

"Really?" he scoffed. "Wow, I hadn't noticed."

"I'm serious!" Squall sniped, anger already boiling beneath the surface.

"So am I," Seifer growled. "Jeez. You really think only a guy and a girl can go to a high school dance together?"

"Well... yeah."

"Okay. Well, you're wrong, cupcake," Seifer explained willingly. "Girls or guys go together all the time, because they couldn't find a date, or—"

Squall sneered nastily, but there was a wounded edge to his voice when he snapped, "Like _hell_ is anyone going to believe that _you_ couldn't find a date."

"Let me finish."

The brunette gulped at the hardness of Seifer's tone. The blond was literally staring him down, holding him by both of his sharply muscled upper arms. Only now did Squall notice that Seifer was gripping him way too tightly, causing his forearms and fingers to tingle with numbness.

It almost felt good, overriding his emotional pain so very easily.

"... Fine," he huffed, pressing his lips together. "Finish."

"Squall... Look, I've gone to a dance with a guy before, several times, actually. Not because the dude was my date or whatever, but because we were friends and we knew we'd have a fuckin' _blast _together. Girls can be such a pain in the ass when you take them out, and man, they're _high _maintenance. Flowers _this_, limo _that_, dinner _here_, after party _there_, yadda yadda yadda. You get the idea. If you go with a friend, you can just chill, dance, hang out with your buddies, flirt and have a great fuckin' time," Seifer stated, and he continued immediately when he saw the disjointed look on Squall's face. "My reasons for asking _you_ out are obviously different. I don't wanna flirt, dance or hang out with anyone _but_ you, got it? That's why I'm asking _you_ and no one else. You're not a stand in and you're not an excuse to go to the ball – more like, the ball's an excuse to spend time with you."

"But... I don't like dances."

"Oh? Have you ever _gone_ to one?"

Squall bit the inside of his cheek. "No."

"Then how would you know that you wouldn't like it?" Seifer retorted smugly.

"I don't have to go to a dance to _know_ what it's like, smartass," Squall frowned.

"Wrong. Some things you'll never understand until you try them."

The brunette ignored the suggestive undertone, which was quite the task to accomplish, and said coldly, "That's fine, too. I don't _want_ to understand the deeper meaning behind a fucking Homecoming Dance."

"Then what about the deeper meaning behind _this_?'

Squall watched him tilting his head, and he catalogued the look on Seifer's face as a break in the blond's commonly careless façade. Squall knew exactly what Seifer meant by "_this_", but that didn't mean that he had the slightest idea of how to answer that question.

Was there _supposed_ to be a deeper meaning?

He figured that there had to be, that there _was_, that they were so much more than friends, yet nothing that could be put into words. He wasn't so sure that he wanted to define their relationship, at least not right now, but Seifer obviously had a different opinion on the subject matter. This was truly a scary path to be walking, but what was the point in walking at all if you had no real goal to reach? Ultimately, Squall realized that he either had to stop going on entirely or finally gather his courage and pick a destination.

Seifer could literally see the storm raging in the depths of Squall's fathomless eyes – the confusion, the fear. However, he wasn't going to interfere this time. There were some battles that Squall had to wage on his own, and this one was definitely one of them.

'_I can't always tell you what you should want, or what to feel, or how to react. You're the only one who can figure that one out, Squall. I think that everything you've ever wanted has always lain dormant somewhere inside you, but you just don't let it out, **ever**. In the end, you're the only one who can decide your fate. If you want to live a life worth living, you've got to take some chances and trust yourself to make the right decision. Make mistakes and learn from them, but don't just shut down. Move on. I do the same fuckin' thing. ... Somehow, I feel like I've been dragging him along this whole time, and I'm getting tired of it. If he doesn't want to go to the dance, fine, I can live with that. I just wonder if he'll ever manage to step out of his comfort zone.'_

In the end, Seifer had a much better understanding of Squall than he thought, yet he still didn't know half as much about the brunette as he believed. Squall Leonhart was a mystery, not just to Seifer but to anyone he had ever encountered, and perhaps this explained – to some extent – why Squall chose to respond the way he did.

"... You're right."

Seifer looked down upon that gorgeous, pale-skinned face, blinking in astonishment.

"What?"

"You're right. I'll... go to the dance with you."

"_What_?"

Squall took a deep breath, scowling. "I said that I'll go to the dance with you."

"Are you yanking my fuckin' chain or what?"

"No, but if you don't shut the hell up, I'll change my fucking mind."

Squall felt Seifer's hands gripping his arms even tighter now, nearly bruising his skin. Sighing, he blew some unruly tendrils of hair out of his face, and he thought to himself that Seifer looked so damn pathetic staring at him the way he did, all wide-eyed, stupidly grinning and slack jawed, but it was actually kind of sweet at the same time. Maybe he owed Seifer a favor, maybe _more_ than just one, but ultimately, his motives for accepting the blond's invitation were of an entirely different nature.

'_I'll hate it... I know I will... I'm probably going to regret agreeing to this... In fact, I **know **I'll regret it. It'll be lame and stupid and **embarrassing**..._ _but when everything's said and done, even the worst night with Seifer would still be a **thousand **times better than the best night I've ever spent at home.'_

Ever since Kato had walked into Squall's life, his spirits had been fading. Things had progressively been getting worse over time, and seemingly the only thing that had kept Squall going during the past horrible, dark weeks had been Seifer's constant presence. What the blond was doing for him, even unconsciously, was worth any night spent in annoyance and boredom. Seifer's words and actions, his hugs and emotional support – they all meant _so much more_ to Squall than the brunette would ever be able to express.

'_... I guess it was about time I did something for him... He's never really asked me for anything, except for going on this trip. Even then, it seemed to be for **my **good rather than his. He... really has good intentions, I guess. I'll make sure Kato won't find out about the dance... or me going with Seifer. It'll all work out, somehow...'_

Squall grunted softly when Seifer released his arms and simply pulled him close, placing a kiss on the top of his head as he wrapped the brunette into a fierce hug. Seifer was breathing kind of fast, or so Squall thought, and he sounded a bit strange when he asked, "Why did you change your mind?"

Thoughtfully, Squall traced the older boy's jugular with his eyes. It was so close, and Seifer was so vulnerable that way. He wasn't guarding himself at all, unafraid of Squall and his own feelings, unaware that the dark haired boy had _lied _to him just minutes before.

Not wanting to be dishonest again and disrespect the blond, Squall rested his forehead against Seifer's shoulder and whispered thickly, "Does it matter?"

_:: "Does it matter?" ::_

'_Does it matter, you ask? Of course it does. **Everything** you say and do matters. Nothing in your life happens without reason... not a single word or act. You're just wired that way. You'd rather stay silent than say something without meaning. I wonder if you were born that way, or if it was something you had to learn. Considering your past... I think I already know the answer to that.'_

Very gently, Seifer shook his head and placed his lips against Squall's earlobe, just smelling and feeling the one guy who held more power over him than any other living, breathing soul ever had or would.

"No..." he murmured tenderly, trying and hoping to be a better man than the one who had preceded him. "It doesn't."

Because in the end, the things that truly mattered were right there in his arms.

* * *

I really hope you'll like this chapter. I hated it for the longest time, but now I'm sort of fond of it.

PS: After reading some of my reviews, I meant to point out last chapter that, no, you're **not** supposed to give choking people who can still cough/talk the Heimlich maneuver. I'm a Paramedic. I know these things. However, a lot of people don't know their first aid that well and will Heimlich the hell out of anyone who looks remotely like they're choking. It happened to me. Anyway, please don't take everything my characters do literally and as the way things **should** be (do I have to make a disclaimer for that?). This remains fiction after all, and yes, my characters make mistakes - they're **supposed **to make mistakes. I personally think it makes them more 'real'. Please bear this in mind when reading my stories. Thanks!

PPS: Along those same lines... mountain sickness really exists! I didn't know until I met someone who has it. It's not fun.


	21. And Thus Spoke Selphie

-:-  
**Chapter 21 - Part 1  
****And Thus Spoke Selphie**

"_I don't know what you were like before we met... but I know that you're a good guy, Seifer Almasy."  
_  
-:-

"Seifer! Hey! Did you find out? _Pleeease_ tell me you did!"

With a wry smile on his lips, the tall blond high school student lazily raised a hand in greeting as he saw a very familiar female weaving her way towards him through the crowded Deling City shopping mall.

"Why gee, hello to you, too," he drawled cynically, while looking down upon the much shorter girl with a small sneer.

"Don't make fun of me, meanie!" the girl named Selphie huffed, playfully punching him in the shoulder as she stopped shortly before him. "Did you ask him? Huh? Did you?"

Seifer rolled his eyes. "I _told_ you I would, didn't I? Jeez, take a breather..."

"Fine!" With a very audible intake of air, Selphie inhaled and released the breath almost as quickly as she had sucked it in. "_Now_, will you tell me?"

Vaguely amused by the girl's eagerness, which bordered to being desperate, Seifer decided to give her a break and volunteer the information he had gathered on her account. "... It's yellow."

When he saw the dumbfounded expression falling over the dark blonde girl's face as she stared at him in what looked like sheer terror, he couldn't help but burst out laughing at the sight. Honestly, what had she expected, asking him to find out Irvine's favorite _dress_ color of all ridiculous things? The cowboy wasn't exactly what Seifer would have considered fashion savvy. He had been amazed to hear that Irvine had asked her to the Homecoming dance at their school, and even more so astonished to find out that Selphie had actually agreed to go.

Looking at her now, however, he could tell that she was definitely entertaining second thoughts about her quick decision to be the freak cowboy's date.

"_Yellow_?" she repeated, sounding a bit nauseated. "Are you _sure_, Seifer? You'd better be, 'cause if you're lying, I swear I'm gonna kick your ass!"

With a horrendous cackle of sadistic amusement, he flicked the iced coffee drink he'd been nursing into a nearby trashcan. He had been leaning slack against a wall by the mall elevators, waiting for Selphie Tilmitt's arrival. Despite his generous intake of sugar and caffeine, he was feeling rather sluggish and annoyed, and his patience wasn't exactly the greatest to begin with. Luckily, she'd been right on time, instead of making him wait for her like most other girls would. He took a few moments to fully savor the sight of her squirming in front of him, before he leered, "I'm as sure as they come, missy. Yellow it is."

She stared at him briefly, green eyes flickering like dying candlelight, before she covered her face with both of her hands and let out a groan.

"Oh, god..."

"I know, it's breaking my heart, too."

"Oh, shut it!"

"What? C'mon, at least it's not puke green," he snickered, looking her up and down in that short, faded jean skirt and the fitted red t-shirt she was wearing. "I'm sure you'll look smashing in yellow. We can paint some black stripes on ya and you'll look like the queen bee. Knowing Irvine, he'll dig a bit of role-play."

"I hate you, Seifer," she growled, swinging her black purse at him in a steep, dangerous arch. "Dammit, why did it have to be _yellow_? What is the matter with that guy? God. I can't _stand_ yellow clothes! They look stupid on me! I hate them! They _don't_ go with my _complexion_! Ugh! Why can't it be blue, or black, or purple, or _anything _but yellow? I hate him!"

"You know, you sound more like Squall by the day, all hating on the world and whatnot," Seifer teased as he shoved his hands down the pockets of his khaki shorts and shifted from one foot to the other in order to stretch his aching calves. He had gone to the gym at the crack of dawn this morning, making ample use of his day off from school, and his muscles felt a tad sore after pumping iron and running sprints for well over two hours.

"Seriously. You and Squally-boy hang out too much," he yawned, now raising his arms up above his head. "He's clearly rubbing off on you. You're like his angry little twin or somethin', I swear. Although it doesn't get much angrier than Squall, I'll say that much... He's a vindictive little bastard."

She stuck out her tongue at him and sniped sagely, "_You_ hang out with him a _lot_ more than I do, mister! Besides, I'll take sounding like him as a compliment, coming from _you _of all people."

"Sure, if you don't mind sounding like a sociopath with an anger management problem," he retorted smugly.

Selphie gave a sound of outrage, stammering "He is _not_ a sociopath!" before she struck him in the ribs with her purse and punched him in the shoulder once more, which Seifer accredited with a mock wince.

"Ow, hey! Take it easy, god! The _pain_, augh...! Man. You're violent, you know that? Here I am, sacrificing my Saturday afternoon to go shopping with you, and what do I get?" he sighed as he demonstratively petted the arm that she had pounded. "I'm being crippled for life here. Appreciate it, really. Say, is it _that_ time of the month again or what?"

"Oh, stop _whining_, you crybaby!" she commanded sternly, while placing her hands on her hips. "You're only here because I _begged_ you to come, and because I promised to say nice things about you to Squally. It's not my fault you're _that _easy to bribe."

"Hey, what can I say, I don't work for free, ya know."

"Oh, that's just as well," she purred, tilting her head in an almost seductive manner while she waved one finger in front of his face. "Neither do I. You'd better be _reeeally _nice to me today, or else I just might tell Squally that you called him a sociopath, and one with an anger management issue, no less!"

"Hey, I only call 'em as I see 'em," the blond grinned with ridiculous complacency.

"Riiight. Nice try. You can't fool me. I know you _worship _the ground he walks on," she mocked and made a face at him, before she ground her extended index-finger into his chest. "_You_ are totally _hooked _on his 'sociopath' biscuits, my poor little friend."

Seifer sneered softly and bared his teeth as he let out a low, feral growl. "Hey now..."

Both of them knew, of course, that Selphie had struck a nerve, and Seifer eventually acknowledged her emotional intelligence with a secretive smile. She was an interesting girl, he had to give her that, and honestly, Seifer didn't mind spending his Saturday afternoon with her at the Deling City Citadel mall. When Selphie had called him on Friday night after his return from the Alclad, she had _literally _begged him to find out Irvine's favorite color and to accompany her on a shopping trip to pick out her Homecoming dress. At first, he had been taken aback, but not necessarily in a bad way. In the end, this was a perfect opportunity for him to pick up an appropriate outfit for himself, and although he trusted his fashion sense one hundred percent, it never hurt to get a second opinion.

Besides, he had some other, more ulterior motives for accompanying her, which were entirely his own.

"Well, you wanna do this, or what?" he asked, motioning around. "Any idea where you wanna go first? I've never been to this mall before, I always go to the other one."

"Yeah, me too, but I thought this one would be closer to your house. Hmm, so much for that. Oh well. Let's go _that_ way and see what we find!" she declared, pointing down a random, marble-tiled hallway as she bounced on the heels of her flip-flop covered feet. "Okay?"

Seifer shrugged. "Fine with me."

"Alrrriiight! Let's go!" she exclaimed exuberantly, hopping around like a very excited rubber ball.

Giggling, she grabbed his arm and yanked him along for the ride. He was wearing a thin, long-sleeved black shirt, which was rather easy to hold on to and looked ridiculously hot against his tan skin and blond hair. Sighing, he pretended to be annoyed as the short girl fiercely led him by the elbow, but he couldn't keep his lips from turning upwards into a content grin.

'_She's like the fuckin' Energizer Bunny, man. I swear, her and Irvine would make the perfect crackpot couple. Not that I'd ever wanna be locked up in a room with the two of them or anything... don't think my brain cells would appreciate the experience.'_

"Sooo, tell me, how was your trip to the Alclad, anyway?" she chirped lightly as they were making their way through the mall. With a smile, she hooked her arm under Seifer's – which proved to be somewhat of a problem as he was nearly one foot taller than her, but to his surprise, she managed. "You didn't tell me much on the phone, you know, and Squall was silent as a _graveyard_ at work this morning. It was _sooo_ frustrating! I couldn't get him to tell me _anything_."

"That's right, he had to work today, huh?" Seifer murmured pensively, turning his gaze up towards the vaulted glass ceiling. "Last time I saw him was yesterday, when I dropped him off at the school parking lot and he rode his bike home."

"Hmm... Did you talk on the phone since then?"

"Yeah, last night... just for a little bit. I called him up to see what he was doin', but I've had more stimulating conversations with my toaster. I just wanted to make sure he had my cell phone number and shit, anyways."

She beamed at him, oddly satisfied with that answer. "Ahh, I see. Hmm... So I take it the trip went _well_?"

His face lit up almost instantly, and he couldn't help the smug coloring to his voice when he lilted, "Yep, you could say that. Let's put it this way: I got me one hot ass brunette date for the Homecoming dance."

"Whaaat? No _way!_" the girl let out a high-pitched, awestruck squeal. "You asked him to the dance andhe said **_yes_**? Oh my gosh! You're going to the Homecoming dance with _Squall_! That's amazing! I can't believe it! Wow... I admit, I'm impressed, stud boy!"

"Well, I _am _irresistible, ya know," Seifer cooed, his lips tilting into a satisfied smirk.

"No kidding. Damn you, Seifer, now I wanna hear _everything_!"

"Oh, you wanna hear 'everything', huh?" he laughed.

"Yes! And don't you _dare_ leave out any details, you hear me!"

"... 'Kay, fair enough..." he agreed with a casual inflection, before his words suddenly slowed to a nervous crawl. "Eh, but first, I... uh... got a question for ya..."

She scrunched her neatly plucked eyebrows together at the sudden grimness in his husky voice, sensing that this was more important than he was letting on. Seifer wasn't the type to get quiet or restless for no reason, and right now, he seemed to be a little bit of both.

"Sure, what is it?" she asked, studying him meticulously from the side. She could literally _hear_ the little wheels milling behind his forehead, and when a steep furrow appeared between his brows, she almost wanted to pound the words out of him, she was that goddamn curious.

"... How long have you known Squall, exactly?"

Selphie instantly noticed the change in Seifer's face – the quick scowl and the somberness that overshadowed the spunk in the blond's glittering, jade green eyes. Without him having to say anything further, she knew that something very significant must have happened between the two boys, and she honestly had no idea what it could have been.

"Hmm... about a year now, I think," she answered thoughtfully. "Maybe ten, eleven months? That sounds about right. Why?"

"I see. I guess you wouldn't know then, and I'm fresh out of ideas now..."

"Know what? What ideas?" the dark blonde female asked, looking intrigued as her brows lifted. "What the heck are you talking about?"

"Well... I was just wondering if you ever saw Squall with someone named 'Aren'... or if you ever heard him talk about the guy before. I have no idea what he looks like, but he'd be older than Squall... by like four or five years. A guy he knew from high school."

"Aren?" she repeated shrewdly, tapping her nose with her index-finger. "No, I don't think so. I mean, we don't go to the same school or anything, but I'm sure I'd remember if he'd ever mentioned someone like that. Why?"

Seifer hastily looked aside to shirk her intent, quizzical gaze.

"... Just wondering," he mumbled evasively.

"Just '_wondering'_? Yeah, right. 'Just wondering' my ass! Who is he?" she demanded, and Seifer found that she sounded like a particularly persistent member of the holy inquisition. "Come on, spill it!"

Seifer hesitated as they were pushing through the crowded hallways, avoiding mothers with strollers and loud groups of bickering teenagers sporting colorful Mohawks and intricate Goth attire. Technically, he knew better than to discuss Squall's private life with anyone, but he considered Selphie somewhat of an exception, since the object of his desire actually _liked_ the girl and she had the boy's best interest in mind. It was too easy of an excuse to pass by, anyway.

"I guess he's Squall's ex-boyfriend, or something like that," Seifer finally explained lamely, shrugging. Of course, Selphie didn't miss the cold, angry gleam that flared up in his eyes, nor the sudden tightness to his features as he pretended to browse the display window of some very flashy hair salon by the name of "Biggs & Wedge."

"Squall had a _boyfriend_?" she asked, her tone incredulous as she prodded and nudged Seifer in the side stubbornly. "Really? I didn't know that! When? _How_?"

"Like, two years ago, I guess. When he was fifteen. That's what he told me, anyway. As for the 'how'... trust me, that one has me stumped, too."

Selphie brought one neatly manicured finger to her lips in thought, and she screwed up her face as she tried to recall _anything_ of significance that might possibly be related to the subject of Squall Leonhart's former romances.

There was nothing. Nothing at all. In fact, she had always figured that an 80 year old widow in a wheelchair had a more active love life than her antisocial co-worker, who seemed to have the emotional IQ of a turnip... well, at least before Seifer had come along, anyhow.

"Aren, you said?"

He nodded. "Yeah."

"No... Squall never mentioned him," she stated, and she shook her head in what almost looked like frustration. "I'm sure of it, 'cause I would've asked him about it, believe me. Of course, just because he never said anything doesn't mean that this Aren fellow doesn't exist. I mean, think about it, Squall never talks about _anything_, let alone his exes! Hm... well, either way, I've certainly never _seen_ him with a guy other than his stepfather, and when he does talk, it's never about anyone but _you_."

She could tell that her casual comment had touched Seifer, just by the stunned way he was now looking at her. She had told the truth, too, because there had never been anyone Squall had been with or mentioned whom she would have ever catalogued as a 'boyfriend', or anything similar along those lines – no one, aside from the brawny teenager who was currently walking by her side, looking decidedly jolted.

"Don't look at me like that," she chided him gently when he continued to give her that fuzzy, vacant-eyed stare. "You know damn well that he likes you."

"I do?" Seifer grunted, sounding more skeptical than he liked.

She frowned disapprovingly. "You _should_."

"Well, he's never exactly very _explicit_ about it," the blond shrugged, trying to look unbothered as he smoothed one hand over his hair. "I mean, I lost count of the number of times he's threatened to neuter or kill me."

"That's Squally for you," Selphie crooned with a small smile. "If he says he wants to kill you, it means he _cares_."

He sneered coldly and purred, "Does it now."

"Yeah, it _does_. Trust my female intuition here, will you?" she continued, before lowering her voice. "Say, uhm... you two have, like, kissed and stuff... _right_?"

Scratching his temple with his cocked middle finger, Seifer responded with yet another vague shrug and muttered, "Yeah, I mean, I've planted a few on him, of course. That's pretty much it, though. He goes apeshit all over the place every time I try to take it a little further."

"So? That's alright, you're doing fine!" she praised him and patted his forearm. "Think about it – you've only known him for like, what, two or three weeks now, and you've already kissed? I mean, when you first met him, did you ever think you two were going to hook up like this?"

The blond let out a snort of laughter. "Oh, _hell_ no. The creepy little bastard wanted to bash my face in the first time we met, and to be honest, the feeling was quite mutual."

Selphie gave him a look of pure satisfaction.

"_Exactly_! You've come a lot further than you might think!" she said earnestly, nodding her head up and down as if trying to convince him with that bobbing motion alone. "Don't be such a horny _dog_ and give him some time, okay?"

"I know, I know," he sighed. "I'm tryin', alright? Cut me some slack."

"I _am_. I'd kick your ass for trying to get into his pants if I didn't like you so much and _wasn't _cutting you slack."

"Yeah, well, thanks, I guess... But anyway, back to what I was saying earlier: the deal is that Squall told me he hates sex because of his relationship with that Aren dipshit, but he didn't exactly explain _why_," Seifer gushed angrily, feeling how his mood slipped every time he thought of the faceless guy and how he had fucked with Squall's life. "He just said that he slept with the dude and regretted it, so now he's being all prude and shit. Anyway, needless to say, I wanna find out more about the whole thing, 'cause it's driving me fuckin' nuts."

Again, Selphie raised a brow, and she ignored the greater part of Seifer's ramblings. "Squall _said _that? He said he _hates _sex?"

"Well... those weren't his exact words, but, yeah, that's basically the gist of it," Seifer shrugged. "Apparently, the dude was a real fucked up son of a bitch."

"Really? He was? How? What did he do?"

"Oh, the fuckin' shitbag did it all, from the sound of it – lying, cheating, manipulating, screwing with Squall's head – you name it, he's done it. Fuckin' dickweed sonuva—"

"_What_? He _did_? Oh my god! What a scumbag! I can't believe it! Okay, now I _really_ wonder who the heck he is. I'd sure love to give _him_ a piece of my mind," she growled, cracking her knuckles with a flash of bloodlust in her eyes.

The blond produced a sarcastic sneer. "Get in line, sweetheart."

"I should investigate this," Selphie grumbled, frowning now. "I can't believe Squall would date such a jerk... that's so weird. Why in the world would he put up with someone like that? He's too smart to date such a loser. Hmph. Maybe Irvy knows something... he's known Squall much longer than I have. I think they went to elementary school together... or kindergarten, or something. I don't remember..."

"Be my guest, just don't let the ice princess find out about you pokin' around in the matter or else I may _really_ lose my nuts. And I'm kind of emotionally attached to them, if you know what I mean."

"Oh lord, stop talking about your nuts already," she sighed playfully, before her face set. "Seriously, though... I'll talk to Irvine, okay? He and Squall used to be pretty close friends. I know Squall lived in Esthar for a while, before he started high school here... and I _think_ Squally's mother met her husband there and then they moved back here to D.C. together, but I'm not sure about that. Anyway, the boys have known each other for a long time, so Irvine's gotta know _something_. I'll let you know, I promise."

"Wait a minute... Raine met Kato in Esthar?"

"I think so," she mused, brushing some stray locks of dark blonde hair behind her ear. "Irvy told me once that Squall's mom was single before they moved to Esthar, and she came back married to a lawyer. They're both really nice, by the way. I met them when they visited Squall at work once."

"Yeah, I've met them, too..." Seifer explained slowly, and for a moment, his focus turned inward as he recalled his last encounter with the Leonhart family. "Raine's cool as shit, but I thought Kato seemed a bit on the shady side."

"You think? I thought he was really sweet myself," Selphie disagreed, and she sounded surprised to hear Seifer's negative opinion of the man.

"Really..." Seifer drawled. "The last time I met him, he was being an ass to Squall."

The dark blonde girl scrunched her nose. "What? How?"

"Well, he made fun of his art, and you know Squall's touchy as hell when it comes to that stuff."

"Are you serious? He made fun of his art? That's not nice. What's up with that? Maybe they had a fight or something? When my mom and I fight, we're pretty mean to each other, too. It's kinda sad, really, but we're both so stubborn."

"Yeah... could be, I guess..." Seifer murmured, and his voice trailed off.

Squall and Kato having a fight? Sure, why not... the idea sounded plausible enough. But no matter how many times he tried to re-evaluate what he had seen of the man's character thus far, he concluded that he just _really_ didn't like the guy.

'_Didn't Raine say he was out playing golf when I was there for breakfast that one day? Hmph. I could totally picture him and **my** old man hitting the green in their fucking Rolexes and Armani slacks together like the snobbish wankers they are. I hate golf. Dad never went to any of **my** games on the weekends, because of that stupid ass sport. Hell, it's a pathetic **excuse** for a sport, if you ask me! I wonder why I ever bothered to please him when I was younger. Not like he ever did much for me but stuff my allowance into my pocket... or my bank account, these days. Fucker. Guess I just didn't know any better when I was just a kid. Well, that's sure changed.'_

"Well, I thought he was wonderful with Raine, Squall and their daughter..." Selphie interrupted his thoughts when she noticed the quickly darkening scowl on his face. "Wait, what's her name again? Oh, no, I forgot! Crap, I'm getting old..."

"... It's Ell."

"Right! Ell! Did you meet her, too? She is _adorable_! Doesn't she just look sooo much like Squally? It's crazy! She's, like, his mini-me!" she exclaimed bouncily, before her head suddenly swung around and she let out a squeal. "Heeey, lookie over there! I love that store! They always have so much neat stuff! Let's go, let's go!"

She excitedly jabbed her finger at a large, posh-looking department store by the name of "MiD-GaR" and quickly dragged a distracted Seifer along towards the door before he had any chance to object. The blond youth was walking at a listless pace, obviously following his own train of thought as he was being pulled across the perfectly polished sales department floor. Selphie noticed a few jealous sideway glances from a small group of girls that they passed arm-in-arm, somewhere by the purse and shoe department, and the concept in itself almost made her laugh.

"People seem to think you're my boyfriend," she giggled at him, looking impish. "Ah, but little do they know that you don't even hear a _word_ of what I'm saying right now, because your mind's _all_ on a certain brunette someone..."

It took his brain a moment to lodge into the conversation, and he blinked dumbly. "... What?"

Judging by the amused look on her face, he still hadn't caught the clue bus.

"... Aw. Love. Such a sweet thing," she sighed, placing one hand upon her heart theatrically.

"The fuck? I didn't hear what you said," Seifer snarled irritably.

She gave him a small smirk.

"I know."

"Then why the hell—"

Suddenly, she stopped, and she slipped her slender arm out from beneath Seifer's to stand facing him, her green eyes beaming up at him fondly as she grasped both of his hands in hers and squeezed them tightly.

"... You really love him, don't you?" she whispered, her voice suddenly as light as a feather as it lingered in the air, and it vanished unheard by anyone but Seifer.

He held her gaze quietly for a few seconds, toughest emerald meeting gentlest jade in the middle of some overcrowded department store. As the truth of her words fully sank in, he finally closed his eyes and shrugged in resignation. "... Tsk. Like I could deny it."

When he looked at her again, Selphie's eyes were literally ablaze in joy over his gruff, but honest answer. He found her empathy a bit abnormal, but then again, she had never struck him as 'ordinary' in the first place. Why exactly she cared so much about him and Squall was truly beyond his understanding, but it didn't particularly bother him, either, so what did it matter? If anything, he was glad to be reaping the benefits of her concern for their budding relationship.

"Well, you know, Seifer..." she started blithely as they finally continued walking down the main aisle towards the women's clothing department, "At first, I didn't think you had it in you. In fact, I thought you looked like the biggest jerk on the face of the planet."

"I remember as much," he mused with a sour grimace. "You nearly chewed my head off that day at 'Ward's'. Thanks very much for providing me with that traumatizing memory, by the way. I'll cherish it forever."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that..."

Selphie's voice trailed off as she stopped at a random clothing rack and began flipping through several plastic hangers with colorful t-shirts and tank tops. Seifer stood next to her, his fisted hands impatiently submerged in his pockets. He shifted from foot to foot for about ten seconds, watching her serene expression as she examined the shirts, before he sniped, "I thought we were here to look at _dresses_."

Oddly, he had a lot of patience where Squall's wayward moods were concerned, but he'd _never_ comprehend how other guys managed to take their girlfriends shopping and let them idle as much as they pleased. It drove him out of his fucking mind, and quickly at that.

"But these are so _cute_!" the girl pouted.

"..."

"Oh, don't glare at me like that."

"..."

"And you're telling _me_ I'm becoming more like Squall by the day? Look who's talking, mister! You look like you were _born _with that death glare!"

"..."

"Stop giving me that, dammit! I just wanna look for a _minute_! Please?"

"..."

"Pretty please? With sugar on top?"

"..."

"Alright, alright... _fine_."

She sighed loudly, gave one of the shirts another longing look-over, then finally turned around and traipsed towards the bridal and gown section. The brawny blond was following her, squeezing past circular racks overflowing with huge, sparkling, billowy dresses that had been sown in any color he could have possibly ever imagined. Selphie examined them fondly, and she seemed particularly taken with a lavender hued dress that Seifer could only describe as bland. Pastel colors really weren't his thing, but he figured that sharing his opinion with Selphie would only result in more trouble than he was actually interested in taking on. Thus, he decided to amble through the section by himself, and his mood dropped rather quickly, until he suddenly spotted a hideous, bouffant, pink taffeta number that caused his vindictive spirits to soar.

"Yo, Selph, I think I've found the _perfect_ dress for ya!" he shouted, his lips splitting into a wicked grin as he tried not to sound too pleased with himself. "Come have a look! It's got Homecoming Queen written all over it!"

"Too late!"

"... Huh?"

"I found one! Come check this one out!" she sang from somewhere in the back.

He followed the sound of her cheerful voice and finally found her wedged in between two clothing racks, triumphantly holding up a long, silky, sunflower-yellow strapless gown that was carefully embroidered with hundreds of glassy, sparkly sequins along the bust and waist that refracted the light in many different, beautiful colors.

"It's _perfect_," she purred, stroking it lovingly and playing with the taffeta under the silk that was probably supposed to give the skirt more volume, or so Seifer's uneducated mind assumed. "I'm going to try it on!"

"I thought you didn't like yellow?" he asked sarcastically.

"I never said that!"

He rolled his eyes, but knew better than to continue arguing with her. Besides, she had already made a beeline for the nearest changing room, and while he was still debating on whether to follow her or not, Selphie gave him an assertive green-eyed look from over her shoulder.

"What are you waiting for?" she giggled. "Come on! I want you to tell me how it looks!"

"Of course, your gracious ladyship," he crooned mockingly, taking a slight bow. "Excuse me for dawdling."

"Hehe! There you go, that's a good slave boy!"

Grinning, he followed her to the immensely oversized, blindingly illuminated dressing rooms. Selphie swiftly locked herself into one of the many small cubicles while he waited outside, leaning against one of the rose colored walls that were adorned with lavender trim and ivory chair rails. Honestly, these changing rooms weirded him the fuck out, which was one of the reasons why he had always refused to take his female dates shopping. Girls were shouting at each other from one stall to the other or delegating their mothers and boyfriends who were waiting outside to bring them that "blue dress with the cute straps in a size 8. Oh, and the pink one, too! And the white one with the gold trim! And—"

... Yeah. Needless to say, he considered scratching out his own eyeballs with a dull spoon more fun than this.

Seifer spotted two other poor bastards sharing his fate, both of the guys about his age, but he didn't recognize either of them. Not that he really cared; it was too hot due to the bright neon lighting to do any elaborate kind of thinking or conversing, and on top of that, he smelled about a dozen different kinds of perfume. That violent mixture of scents and sensory overload soon caused his head to spin and his stomach to turn in revolt.

'_Man, get me the fuck outta here. Ugh. Men's dressing rooms are never like this. I hope she's done soon...'_

"Seifer...?"

He turned when he heard his name, almost hoping to see Selphie, but finding someone entirely different.

He almost lost his thought process right then and there.

'_... You have **got** to be shitting me.'_

"... Rinoa," he drawled with unnecessary scorn to his voice, forcing a half-smirk on his lips. "'Sup?"

She reciprocated his attempt at a smile, not doing much better at it, really. "Hey..."

Shit. He hadn't expected to find himself face-to-face with the one girl he had pretty much avoided in school for over a week now. It wasn't that he was afraid of talking to her or anything, but he had no desire to explain the details of his rapid departure at the playground well over a _week _ago. All the same, there she was, flanked by Michelle and the black haired, ponytail-wearing chick he had met at the club, Dari. The three of them were clutching armfuls of hangers with what looked to be ball attire, and they were staring at him as if he was the eighth goddamn Wonder of the World.

"What are you doing here?" Rinoa finally asked warily, pursing her lips. She was wearing her chestnut brown hair in a long French braid, and he had to admit that it looked good on her. Hell, she _was_ easy to look at, he had never claimed anything different.

"Shopping," he answered with a lazy shrug and a cool glint in his eyes as he continued to lean against the wall. "What about you?"

"We're getting dresses for the Homecoming dance," Michelle explained, and he acknowledged her arrogant inflection with a tight sneer. Apparently, she was upset with him over standing Rinoa up after their night at the club, or something similar along those lines, anyway. Honestly, he couldn't have cared less.

"Well, I'm not getting a _dress_, lemme tell you that much," he retorted with a dry note of humor, flicking a piece of lint off his black sleeve with his index-finger.

"But you'd look good in one," Rinoa joked lightly, winking at him with those doe brown eyes and sticking out her tongue almost naughtily. He had to admit, it was somewhat of a turn-on.

"I'm not gonna take that as a compliment," he snorted.

Michelle smiled nastily and cooed, "Maybe you should, Seifer. There's something decidedly _feminine _about you."

"Ya don't say," he retorted icily. "I'm guessing you know all about what's considered masculine and what isn't."

"She's kidding," Rinoa laughed, batting her lashes at him as she tried to lighten the mood. "Don't worry, you're about as manly as they come."

"Yeah. Thanks... I guess. Well, if I ever decide to pick up cross-dressing, I'll let ya know," Seifer grunted, and somehow, the hard edge in his tone had softened. He wasn't really feeling in the disposition to argue with the girl, no matter how little he thought of her or her posse. She was actually behaving herself quite cordially today, not entirely slipping into the class bimbo role she seemed to have adopted as her second nature. It made conversing with her tolerable.

'_At least I'm still able to charm the ladies. Squall's been chopping away at my ego, man. It's almost refreshing to talk to someone who speaks in full sentences and doesn't look like they're plotting your **murder **every time you dare to open your mouth.'_

As if on command, the girl suddenly shifted her weight onto the balls of her feet to rock back and forth, inclining her head as if in embarrassment. "... I'm sorry, by the way."

"Sorry?" he repeated quizzically, surprised by her subdued inflection. "For what?"

"The other night, at the club... or, uhm, the playground, rather..." she murmured, casting him quick glances from mesmerizing eyes that were veiled by a long curtain of coal black lashes. "I know I had too much to drink. I was completely out of line. See, my parents sent me to a private summer school over vacation, so I didn't get to do anything fun, like go out dancing or drinking. So... I kinda got carried away that night with you, and I'm sorry. I was really happy to have you with us, and I didn't mean to piss you off with the things I said or did."

He frowned, just slightly, before he clutched his arms before his chest and shrugged, "You didn't."

"I didn't...?"

"Nope."

She looked stunned. "Oh."

"Yeah, so don't get worked up over it or anything," he drawled graciously, wooing her with a grin that nearly knocked the legs out from under her. "I just had some shit to take care of, that's all. Nothin' for you to worry about."

"I see..." Rinoa muttered, her tone tentative and _very_ damsel-in-distress. "That's good. I'm really glad you're not mad..."

"Aw, c'mon. How could I be mad at a girl like you?" he crooned, ignoring the fact that he was pretty much lying through his teeth in order to boost his own, testosterone-spiked ego.

"I don't know," she replied suggestively. "Why couldn't you?"

"You're too pretty to get mad at."

She giggled and graced him with a flirty smile. Then, suddenly, she glanced from the dresses in her arms to a point somewhere on Seifer's face. For some reason, she suddenly seemed to have problems meeting his gaze.

"Uhm... by the way..." the pretty brunette started carefully, and Seifer suddenly noticed a streak of blush glowing brightly on her cheekbones. "About the Homecoming dance... I, uh... I meant to ask you if you'd like to go with—"

"_Seifer_!"

His heart skipped a series of beats when he saw Selphie literally catapulting herself out of her stall, almost slamming the door square into his unassuming face. Selphie was fully clad, although her shimmering yellow dress looked a bit askew around the top and her zipper seemed to be only halfway done. She was barefoot, wearing only one of her black flip-flops. All the same, she looked nothing short of beautiful standing there in the middle of the changing rooms, her face flush, her hair sticking up in all kinds of directions and her eyes blazing in every imaginable facet of green.

All in all, Seifer thought, Irvine had much better taste in women than he had ever accredited him with.

"Hi, I'm Selphie Tilmitt! Nice to meet you!" Selphie bellowed, waving and beaming at a stunned Rinoa and her friends. "You must be going to Seifer's school!"

After a moment spent in confused silence, the dark haired girl finally snapped out of her trance and let out a sound of surprise. "... Oh!"

Seifer had to suppress a look of astonishment, as well as a snort of laughter when he saw Rinoa's stumped face. The brunette girl seemed taken aback by that yellow whirlwind that had placed herself smack dab in the middle between her and Seifer, smiling as brightly as the morning sun. It took the dark haired girl a minute to gather her composure, and when she eventually hitched a sweet smile on her face, Seifer thought that he had never seen anything more fake in his entire life.

"Oh, yeah, nice to meet you, too," Rinoa chirped, the curve of her lips as hard as plaster. "My name's Rinoa Heartilly, and these are my friends Chelle and Dari. I'm actually in Seifer's class. I'm a senior, too. We know each other pretty we—"

"Aw, that's too cute," Selphie cut her off mercilessly. "Well, I'm sure I'll see you at the dance, then!"

Rinoa blinked and looked at Seifer, before she muttered blankly, "What? I—"

But Selphie had already turned her back on the flustered girl and decided to dote on Seifer instead, putting up a marvelous display of feminine vanity.

"Seifer, sweetie, what do you think?" she asked, twirling and posing for him in her new dress the way only a girlfriend would. "Oh, wait, can you zip me up, please? I was in a total hurry to show this to you, so I forgot! Thank youuu!"

He couldn't quite help the sadistic grin that split his face when he placed one hand on the small of her back and zipped her up very carefully. Selphie was doing her part in this strange charade, batting her eyelashes at him and holding on to his arm while cooing in gratification. Seifer chanced a quick glimpse at Rinoa, who looked to be at the verge of a full blown coronary; it was obvious that she seemed to be mistaking Selphie for Seifer's ball date, and their actions certainly weren't suggesting differently. Thus, the brunette girl was glaring at the 'couple' in fiery brown-eyed loathing, ready to launch herself down Selphie's throat, when Michelle and Dari wisely ushered her into a far away changing room stall and quickly closed the door behind themselves.

For a moment, Seifer and Selphie simply stood staring at each other, trying to keep up their straight faces. Knowing that Rinoa was still in earshot, Selphie merely grinned at the blond and trilled merrily, "Well, I guess I'm taking this one. Unzip me, babe!"

"That's one thing you'll never have to tell me twice," Seifer leered and smoothly pulled down the zipper of her dress. She winked and disappeared inside her stall once more, looking frighteningly mischievous.

'_Well... That was, erh, something else,' _he mused as he finally resumed his slack position by the wall, looking around the room in wonder._ 'Selphie totally made Rinoa believe she was my girlfriend or something. She can't know how much that broad annoys the piss outta me, so what was her motivation for jumping in like that? Squall...? Hey, it's not like I was going to totally drop the ball on that one or anything. I could've come up with some kinda brilliant excuse by myself if Rinoa would've really asked me to go to the dance with her, which I'm pretty sure she was about to do when Selphie barged in. ... Oh well, it all worked out, I guess.'_

He thought he could hear frantic whispering coming from the direction of Rinoa's stall, but he wasn't in the mood to eavesdrop. Surely, they had to be talking about him and the girl they had mistaken as his date. It was an interesting setup, he thought, and he wondered how surprised Rinoa would _really _be once she'd find out he was actually going to the dance with Squall.

'_She didn't really seem to like Squall all that much, if ya ask me. I wonder why? ... Yeah, right. I guess **nobody** likes him too much, considering what a crabby asshole he can be. Maybe she had the hots for him at some point and he offered her a free sex change like he did to me? I wouldn't put it past him by any means, if she ever did come on to him. Squall's a good-looking lil fucker... I honestly can't picture someone like her passing him up entirely just 'cause he's less talkative than a deaf-mute. I wonder how long they've been going to school together, anyway.'_

Seifer pondered that concept for a moment, not too sure how much he fancied the thought of Rinoa fawning over Squall, or them possibly having grown up together. It seemed as if everyone had known Squall much longer than he had, and he knew next to nothing about the brunette boy's past. It irritated him, and although he couldn't have done anything to change this, he still wished that he had been in Rinoa's or Irvine's place; they had spent months and years in Squall's presence, perhaps even before he had become all antisocial.

'_I remember seeing that photo of him and Griever looking all happy together... how old was he when it was taken, I wonder? Ten, eleven, something like that? He looked young, and nothing like he does today. I mean, he actually looked **cheerful **and shit! Like he didn't have a care in the world. These days, it's like there's always something on his mind, and I bet it's never anything good... For some reason, I feel like the story he told me about his ex-boyfriend is just the tip of the iceberg. I really wanna know what's going on inside his head...'_

"Seifer?"

He started when he noticed Selphie standing right in front of him, changed into her former attire and giving him a strange, lowbrow look. She seemed almost concerned, and she was watching him with disturbing, hawk-like intensity.

"Oh, hey. How long have you been standing there?" he asked, pushing himself off the wall.

"... A while," the dark blonde female replied vaguely, and she didn't smile. "Come on, let's go."

She was carrying her yellow dress on a hanger, draped across her arm. He followed willingly when she led him to the cashier's station, not saying a word. Seifer wondered why she was so quiet; he figured that it either had something to do with Rinoa, or him being spaced out in front of her dressing room.

"... So you're taking this one?" he tried to strike up a conversation, and she finally veered her head around to look at him.

"Yes. I'll ask them to hold it for me. I don't feel like carrying it around or taking it to my car right now."

"What, we're not done yet?" the blond joked.

"No, I still need some matching yellow shoes..." she mused, before glaring at him out of mysterious jade green eyes. "Besides, I figured we could have some lunch together and... _talk_."

"Talk?" he repeated in a stretched tone of voice. "... Eh, alright."

Talk? What was it that she wanted to 'talk' about that she had to go and say it in such a pregnant tone of voice? Maybe this _was_ about Rinoa, after all. Could Selphie be pissed at him or something? Why? It wasn't _his_ fault that Rinoa had nearly thrown herself at him, and besides, Selphie was in no position to be upset with him.

'_Women... tsk. I just don't get them.'_

He watched her talking to the cashier lady and handing over her dress, which was then being stowed away safely on a holding rack. When Selphie turned back around to him, she was staring at his face so hard that he finally frowned and asked, "Alright, what the hell is wrong?"

She shook her head.

"Nothing. Let's go."

Seifer had a notion that her 'nothing' was very similar to Squall's 'nothings' – a dumb excuse, meant to cover up something much bigger and more important than 'nothing' would ever be.

'_... How fuckin' annoying.'_

She wasn't hooking her arm under his this time. Instead, she paced quietly outside the store and down the nearest hallway, her pretty face dragged. He was trudging slowly by her side, not sure if he was supposed to say something, and if so, _what_. He didn't understand how she had turned from the exuberant fireball jumping out of the dressing room into this moody, contemplative looking young woman who flat out refused to talk to him. She had her arms crossed before her chest, and her eyes were lowered to the ground as she was walking.

'_I don't think I've ever seen her frown like that... what the hell is going on? Her brain channels almost change as fast as Squall's do, man. I so don't get it.'_

Just as his patience was about to snap, she finally stopped in her stride and turned to look up at him. He identified the shallow glow in her eyes as hesitation, or perhaps even disapproval.

He had absolutely no idea what she was thinking about.

"Seifer... did you sleep with her?"

"W-_what_?" he bellowed, nearly choking on the words in shock over this question that he had never seen coming. "What the hell? No, I _didn't_!"

It was his turn to cross his arms defensively, and she acknowledged the defensive gesture by narrowing her eyes in suspicion, yet remaining silent.

"Why the hell are you asking me that?" Seifer growled, glaring at her in irritation. "I mean, what the fuck!"

"Because I want to know," she replied simply.

"Does it _matter _if I did?"

"Not to me, no," Selphie murmured vaguely, pursing her lips. "But I wonder if Squall knows how much that chick is into you."

"She isn't _that_ into me!" he protested.

"Whatever. She would've asked you to the dance if I hadn't barged in. What would you have said then, Seifer?"

"That I was already going with _someone else_," he bit. "She's just a classmate, alright? That's it. Besides, I don't give a rat's ass if she has the hots for me or not."

"A classmate, huh... So, Squall knows her, too?"

"Yeah, he does. Probably much longer than I have, as a matter of fact."

She gave him a dark, unhappy look. "... You think she's cute, don't you."

For some reason, he felt like she was attacking him, and he couldn't figure out why. All he knew was that her suggestive, bitchy comments were making him angry. Annoyed, he shrugged and answered honestly, "She's hot, yeah. So what?"

"... Do you flirt with girls like that when _Squall_ is around?"

"I wasn't _flirting_ with her!" he barked exasperatedly. "Jesus fuckin' _Christ_!"

"I _heard_ you, Seifer," she chided, and her tone had become sharper. "Maybe you're not doing it consciously or whatever, but you were _definitely _flirting with her. It doesn't bother _me_, you know, I mean do whatever you want, but if what Squall said about his ex-boyfriend is true, then you have to be more careful."

"Why?" he asked, feeling more clueless than he figured he should have. "What's the big deal?"

"The 'big deal' is that he's been _hurt_, you idiot!" she snapped at him, and it took her a moment to compose herself and swallow down most of her anger. "... Seifer, why do you think it took so long before I gave Irvine my phone number, huh? I'll tell you - because I've dated guys like him and _you_ that flirt with anything that has a pulse, and it's a very hurtful habit, okay? Maybe you don't mean anything by it, maybe Irvine doesn't mean anything by it, but it can cause more damage than you could ever imagine."

"I _didn't_ mean anything by what I said!" Seifer defended himself. "Fuck, I don't even _like _her!"

"Look... all I'm saying you is that, if I was Squall, and I'd dated a guy once who cheated on me and treated me like garbage, I'd be very hesitant to trust someone again," she sighed, placing her hands on her narrow hipbones. "So, if he really means something to you, for God's sake, watch what you say when you're around him!"

"I _already_ have to _fuckin_' do that, anyway!" he spat bitterly, and his gaze darkened with quickly surfacing spite. "It's like everything I fuckin' say pisses him the fuck off! I can't do _anything _without him freaking out! Not a fucking thing! Why do _I_ always have to be patient, huh? Why do _I_ always have to watch my fuckin' mouth? Poor Squall this, poor Squall that! _Fuck_ that! I don't _care_ if he got his feelings hurt before I came along, alright? It wasn't my goddamn fault! I'm so _sick _of paying for something that I didn't even **fucking** _do_!"

With a start, Selphie watched him drawing back his right leg and kicking the aluminum trashcan they had been standing next to. The loud, metallic noise caused her to clutch her hands to her ears, and she flinched when he turned back around to her, his face hard and his eyes cold. Suddenly, she realized that this issue was going a lot deeper than she had originally anticipated. Of course, she knew how difficult Squall could be, but Seifer had always seemed so unbothered by his attitude. Even so, there he was, sucking sharp breaths through gritted teeth while scowling at her, the dented trash bin, and everyone who just so happened to walk by.

"... I'm sorry," she murmured, tentatively placing her hand on his forearm in order to soothe his raging temper. "I know it's difficult... I was just... trying to watch out for you two... I'm _sorry_."

He sighed and raked his hand through his hair, biting back his anger. Perhaps she was right. Perhaps he _had_ flirted, just a little bit. He honestly hadn't meant anything by it – he was just a breathing _male _human being who had been a habitual flirt for as long as he could remember. A part of him now felt guilty for lashing out at her, because really, none of this was her fault. He had gotten himself landed in this complicated, fucked up disaster of a relationship with Squall all by himself, and he had passed by plenty of opportunities to simply hit the ground and run.

Why?

The answer to that question was so simple and yet so complicated that it nearly drove him to his knees.

"It's not your fault," he finally groaned flatly, and the coarse resignation in his own voice scared him. "You're right. I'll be more careful."

"But—"

"I'm sorry for yelling at ya," Seifer interrupted her attempt at speaking. "I know none of this is supposed to be easy. I _know_ it takes work to be in a relationship with someone. Unfortunately, that's about where my knowledge on all of this ends... I've gone on enough dates to last me for two lifetimes... I mean, I used to have one helluva turnover... but I've never seriously given a shit about anyone before, so really, I have no fuckin' clue what I'm doing. Of course I care about the fact that Squall's been hurt... and of course I wanna do it right and treat him the way he deserves to be treated. It's just..."

He grimaced, lost for words on how to explain exactly how he felt. Luckily, Selphie seemed to need no explanations, other than the one written in his face.

"I know," she murmured, her voice and touch nothing but gentleness. "I know. It's okay."

Seifer frowned. "I'm not so sure that it is."

"But _I_ am. Listen... I'm so sorry for bitching at you... I know you love him, and believe me, he loves you, too. I promise. He may not be very good at showing it, but I can _tell_ how much he cares every time I see him when he's around you! He's got that _look_ in his eyes, and only you can put it there. Please, don't give up on him, Seifer," the girl pleaded in a broken whisper.

"... Tche," he snorted, raising his chin cockily. "I've come this far, I'm not gonna give up now."

Selphie squeezed his arm so tight that it hurt, although he would've never admitted it, of course. He produced something like a semi-smirk, and he could tell that she appreciated his efforts. Honestly, now that he thought about it, he had never been _friends_ like this with a girl before; he had always been too preoccupied with bedding his companions to put any effort into establishing a mental or emotional connection with them.

Squall and Selphie had taught him, each in their own way, that life wasn't just about getting laid.

"You know... Squall's really something else. He's... different from everyone else I've ever met," Seifer mused as they continued to idle around the mall, walking arm in arm again with no concrete direction. "He pretends he doesn't give a fuck about anyone, but he does. He'd _die_ for his mother and his little sister, and he wouldn't even waste a thought on it. He's funny, too, and much smarter than I'll ever be... and he's never afraid of kicking my ass. I guess he's the kind of challenge I've always needed."

"Not to mention the fact that he's _hot_!" Selphie giggled.

"Heh. Yeah, there's that, too, of course."

"He has such a pretty face, it's not even right," the dark blonde girl sighed, clicking her tongue. "And he doesn't even know it!"

"Nope. He doesn't have an inkling of how hot he is," Seifer snorted. "It's funny as fuck."

"Well, make sure you keep telling him, maybe he'll believe it some day."

"Fat chance, but I'll try. Of course, then he might turn into some Romeo and try to catch up on all he's been missing out on these past couple of years, when he was as frigid as a nun."

"I doubt that," she chided. "He's not like that. Besides, _I_ think you're just perfect for him and he knows it, too, so dontcha worry about a thing, okay?"

"Hmph," he grunted, not sounding too convinced.

"You know..." she sang, and her voice suddenly became very serious. "I have no idea what you were like before we met... but I know that you're a good guy, Seifer Almasy."

He gave a low, husky chuckle. "You're gonna make me blush."

"Whatever."

She stuck out her tongue at him and opened her mouth to say something else, when her scatterbrained mind suddenly seemed to have found something of greater interest.

"Look, it's a key store," she explained in awe, motioning to their right. "I need to get a copy of my mailbox key made, one of these days... Too bad I didn't bring it. Isn't it funny though, how keys are made and stuff? I totally don't get it. Is there really a different key for each lock? It sounds so impossible. I wanna learn how to pick locks! Now, that'd be _cool_!"

When her curious gaze slid from the small key store to Seifer's face, she was puzzled by the blank, distant look in the tall blond boy's eyes. He was staring at the shop in a strange stupor for several seconds, until his face suddenly lit up and he swiftly yanked her towards the counter by the arm, where an old man in blue overalls was waiting for customers.

"Eeep! Seifer, not so fast!" she yelped, struggling to keep up with him. "Ow, my arm! Heeey, what are you doing?"

He ignored her protests until they had already come to a skidding halt in front of the store. Scratching her head, Selphie monitored how Seifer reached into his back pocket, pulled out a chain with about five or six keys on it and swiftly started to fidget with one of them.

"Seifer?" she repeated his name, although she no longer even expected an answer. The blond seemed rather engrossed in the task of removing that one particular silver key from his chain, and his expression was almost manic as he cursed silently under his breath.

'_What is he doing? Is he trying to get a key made? Why is he so excited about it, though? How weird.'_

Eventually, Seifer had succeeded in removing the key, and he slapped it down on the glass counter with a grin. Selphie couldn't figure out why he looked so content with himself.

"I need a copy of this one, please," Seifer told the man, still beaming.

"Of course, sir. Just one copy?" the man in the overalls asked, examining the key.

"Yeah, just one."

"Okay, I'll have that ready for you in just a minute."

"Thanks."

Whistling, Seifer twirled his black metal carabiner keychain in his hand, then placed his hands behind his back. Selphie was still watching him suspiciously from the side, and after a moment of waiting for him to explain, she nudged him in the side impatiently.

"You're getting a key made?" she asked curiously. "Why? What key is it?"

"It's my house key," he replied, smirking like a little kid who was up to no good.

"Your house—"

Before she could've finished the sentence, her brain had already done the math. Her eyes widened as she glanced at the key maker and back to Seifer, suddenly knowing exactly what that mischievous glint in his eyes meant.

"Wait a minute..." she breathed in awe. "Does that mean what I _think _it does?"

"I have no idea what you're thinking with that oddball brain of yours," he said smoothly. "If I did, I'd be concerned."

"Hah, yeah right, nice try! I can see right through you, mister! That key is for Squally, isn't it?"

He gave her just the tiniest, most secretive of smirks and murmured. "Maybe. Then again, maybe you're just whacked in the head."

"Whatever! You can't fool _me_!" she exclaimed, jabbing her fist into the air in triumph as she jumped up and down. "Oooh, this is _fabulous_ – Seifer is getting Squall a key to their romantic love nest! How sappy! How outrageous! I love it!"

"Hey, hey, keep it down, killer," Seifer chuckled, patting her on the head. "It's not that goddamn exciting."

"Bullshit! It is _the_ most exciting event of the week! This is a big deal, you know! Gosh... so, so, when are you going to give it to him?"

"I dunno... I haven't thought that far ahead," Seifer answered honestly. "What do you think? Any brilliant ideas?"

"Hmm..."

She was scratching her chin as her mind seemed to be working hard on concocting the most romantic, heartwarming, spectacular scenario that it could come up with. Most of them involved either unicorns, rainbows, Seifer proposing on one knee at Niagara Falls, Squall in a wedding dress on a beach in Hawaii, or both of the boys honeymooning on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. Unfortunately, she had to acknowledge that neither of the two teens were quite at that point of commitment yet, so she finally settled for a more simplistic and doable scheme.

"How about you cook him a nice dinner?" she suggested, laughing at his horrified expression. "What? You can't cook?"

He made a face and drawled, "Well... if you count turning on the microwave..."

"Just get a cookbook and try something that sounds good! It's really easy! I'll help you, if you want," she offered generously, before adding with a giggle, "I'll be your fairy godmother or something!"

"Fuck, you may _have_ to be," Seifer sighed, rubbing his temple. "Can't I just take him out to eat or somethin'?"

"Nooo, that's not the same thing," Selphie bristled, shaking her head and flapping her hand in disapproval. "No, no, no. Invite him over to your place – in fact, do it _tonight_! Get some candlelight going and stuff, set the _mood_, then give him the key! It'll be sooo sweet! Ahhh, I wish I could see it. Can I hide in your closet?"

"Ah, I dunno..." he said, eyeing his 'fairy godmother' warily.

Somehow, Squall had never struck him as the kinda guy who would fall for that sort of cheesy setup. And the idea of Selphie camping out in his closet was just downright creepy.

"Seriously! _Trust me_, alright?" she said, regarding him with a look of stern reprimand. "He'll love it. He may not look like it, but he actually enjoys eating."

"Really. Whenever he's around _me_, he eats like a fuckin' pigeon."

"He's probably just nervous."

"In that case, I doubt eating _my _cooking is going to change any of that. He'll probably think I'm trying to poison him or something."

"Don't worry, it'll be fine! Have some faith in yourself, will ya!"

"Well... I guess it's worth a try..." he shrugged unsurely, screwing up his face. "Not like I have much to lose, anyway."

'_... And on a side note,_ _the idea of a romantic dinner, candlelight and Squall late at night at my apartment has a rather promising ring to it. Talk about a world of possibilities...!'_

As if she had read his pubescent fantasies on his face, Selphie promptly slapped him over the head and growled, "Down, boy! Don't be getting any dirty ideas now! This isn't about getting into his pants, understand?"

"Uh, yeah, of course," he pretended weakly, failing to look as innocent as he would've preferred. "Wouldn't dream of it."

"You are so full of shit!"

Selphie shook her tiny fist at him, but she was acting amused rather than outraged. Her eyes were sparkling like perfectly polished emeralds, alight with the passion of someone who cared much more about others than she did about herself. She adored these boys, and she wanted to see them happy, because no matter what anybody else would ever say about them, she knew that they deserved happiness more than anyone.

Seifer didn't know whether her plan was wise, or how he would possibly manage to conjure up this weird 'crème brulée' thing she was now raving about. He didn't know if Squall would ever open up to him, or if they would always stay just one step apart from each other. He didn't know how to undo the gruesome damage that had been caused by a guy he had never met, or how to make Squall smile for him just once, but as he stood laughing in front of the key store and waited for his spare to be done, Seifer would've never believed that Selphie's plan could ever...

... Go _wrong_.

* * *

Yes, yes... somewhat of an unusual chapter, I know. I'm really liking Selphie these days. She's a cool character to play around with. She actually reminds me of my best childhood friend - her name is Kathrin - they even _look _alike. Anyways, I truly enjoy her character.

And... surprise, surprise... **this is not the entire Chapter 21** :) ! Although this is just about as long as my other chapters, there is a second part - an extra part, so to say - to it. If you want to find out more, please **visit my livejournal** - you'll **find the link in my author profile** (just click on my name on the top of this page). You don't have to be a livejournal member or anything like that to read it. Look for the journal entry titled "Chapter 21 - Extra".

Thank you for reading :)


	22. Lullaby For a Stormy Night

-:-**  
Chapter 22  
****Lullaby for a Stormy Night**

"_You don't owe me anything."_

-:-

_I still remember_

_When I was younger_

_Life was so simple then_

_Now I feel empty_

_Like something's missing_

_How I wish you were here_

_I can't let you go_

_It's the middle of the night and my heart's in overload_

_Cause I still can't let you go_

_But I know in my heart that you already know._

_You already know._

_"Seed" - Stealing Eden_

-:-

He stood in his closet, bare naked, holding the lumpy pile of damp clothing that he had worn earlier in his arms, not minding or even noticing how uncomfortable the wet fabric felt against his exposed skin. His pale body was long and lean; strings of meticulously shaped muscles shifted with every seemingly unimportant move that he made. His dark blue, somewhat cloudy-looking eyes screened his carefully organized clothing racks, looking for something very specific. Other than the occasional twist of his torso or tilt of his head, however, the boy's body was perfectly still, and his breathing was so regular and calm that it couldn't even be heard.

Nothing really seemed wrong with this picture at all, except for the broken look on the brunette's face and the bloodstained gauze bandages that wrought around his sinewy wrists as silent testimony to the shadows burning in the youth's heart.

Squall had cleaned both his bathroom and _himself_ after the phone call of thirty minutes ago – he had taken a scalding hot shower and scrubbed off the blood and the other filthy body fluids that his stepfather had marked upon his skin. His mind was still revolting against the memories; his soul was a pathetic mess pleading his hands for deliverance by the touch of the cutter which was, once again, stashed in one of Squall's bathroom drawers.

He would no longer need it tonight, but there would always be a tomorrow, no matter how badly he wished for the world to simply stop turning.

Something was pulsating numbly in the back of his head every time he dared to draw a breath, and he had difficulty focusing his gaze upon the countless shirts, pants and sweaters that were stacked all around him. He didn't color-coordinate his clothes or anything of the like; there wouldn't have been much of a point, anyway, since most of his attire was either white, black, or of some other dark, unremarkable color. His boots and sneakers were arranged neatly on the floor in metal shoe racks that he had purchased and assembled by himself.

Still, none of this felt like it was his own; it was as if he had never truly belonged – not to this family, and much less to this house.

He continued to search the racks with his eyes, occasionally reaching out to brush a few hangers aside to get a better look. He didn't understand why it was taking him so long to find what he was looking for. His brain felt numb and sluggish, making it practically impossible for him to remember where he had placed the item in question, but even considering these unfavorable circumstances, he knew that he should've spotted it a long time ago.

'_What if he took it...?'_

The thought startled him like a slap in the face, and he whisked through his shirts more frantically now. His pulse accelerated as his fingers moved much more hastily, and without even realizing it, he fell into a state of panic. Gritting his teeth until his jaws started to ache, he tried to retain at least some marginal control over his already unstable emotions.

'_It's not a big deal, just get a grip! So what if it's gone? I can always get a new one, right? ... Fuck. Who am I kidding? I could never get one **exactly **like it.'_

Finally, when his eyes caught just the narrowest flash of bright red fabric, a blissful surge of relief flooded through his mind, and he let out the breath he had unconsciously been holding.

'_... There it is.'_

With a grateful sigh, he lifted himself onto the very tips of his toes and reached for the hanger with outstretched fingers. It was almost within his grasp, but suddenly, he found himself thrown off balance when his headache flared up and transgressed from that dull, thumping ache he had been feeling to a sharp, nearly intolerable spike of pain that shot from the base of his skull to his forehead. With a groan, he dropped the laundry he had been cradling in one arm and slapped both of his hands to the sides of his head, trying to grapple the startling nausea and dizziness that suddenly caused his world to catapult out of orbit.

"D-damn, what..."

His breath now came in quick, heavy thrusts that were shallow and uneven. He was often plagued by headaches after cutting himself, but never quite like this. His body broke out in a cold sweat, causing him to shudder as he careened to the side on wobbly legs and his sight whitened out momentarily.

'_S-stop it... ugh... just...'_

As the closet around Squall spun and bobbed in rabid revolutions, he was forced to lean against the door frame for support. His brain felt as if it was being crushed by the walls of his skull. His whole body was under constant pressure. Digging his fingernails into his temples did absolutely nothing to ease the pain, but it was all he could do – suffer... and wait.

And so he waited - groaning, panting and holding back the tears - until the gouging surge of agony slowly passed from his head and the pressure in his blood vessels eased. It didn't vanish completely, but the edge had been taken off the drilling pain, and it had turned into something that he could bear, at least for the time being.

'_Shit... that **hurt**... fucking **bitch**... ugh...'_

He didn't allow himself to collect his thoughts, and he didn't give his tortured body the time it realistically required to recover, either; instead, he pushed himself off the wall and proceeded to his former position by the racks with imbalanced steps, grimacing as his vision continued to waver before his eyes. More carefully this time, he raised his right arm above his head and pulled down the hanger with the red piece of clothing he'd been searching for so stubbornly.

... Seifer's football jersey.

Squall's face went blank as he took a step back and stared at the shirt, holding it almost reverently in his fingers. He caressed the smooth, scarlet red fabric with his thumb, and after a moment of uncertainty, he suddenly pressed the shirt against his throat and chest – whether for comfort, warmth or both, he couldn't even say.

'_What am I doing...?'_

Despite what he had told the blond the week before, he hadn't washed Seifer's shirt – nor returned it to him, obviously. As he nuzzled the jersey, he cherished the fact that the lightweight fabric smelled of Seifer, the coffee they had shared that morning, and the body wash that Squall had used at the other boy's house. It was a very soothing blend of fragrances, bringing a sense of peace to his frayed mind. Squall had always enjoyed the aroma of freshly brewed coffee, and as for Seifer's smell... he was slowly starting to associate more and more positive memories with the blond's unique scent, which was as cool and crisp as the vast ocean waters, yet still as warm and comforting as a stack of freshly cut hay.

Nonetheless, he felt stupid for nuzzling an article of clothing, like a child clutching his favorite blanket as if it had the magical power to ward off nightmares, fears, and the monsters under his bed. He wanted to give Seifer his shirt back, not only because he considered it the right thing to do, but because he was stubborn like that... yet, at the same time, he couldn't bring himself to perform the seemingly so simple task. In some odd way, that silly football jersey had become more important to him and his crumbling sanity than he figured it ever should have been.

'_I guess it won't do any harm to keep it a little while longer... it's just a shirt, and he hasn't asked for it back, anyway. Besides, he still has my shirt, too, so perhaps we're even. I wonder if he's going to give it back to me today? I guess he could, although I doubt he'd call me just for that. Does he even remember that he has it? Whatever... if he doesn't give it back, I won't ask for it. I really don't care.'_

Standing quietly in his closet, he tried to recall the short phone conversation he'd had with Seifer less than thirty minutes ago, but his memory had become sort of foggy and dense. Usually, he had no trouble remembering the exact words of a conversation, regardless of how meaningless it might have been, but for various painful reasons, tonight was different. He vaguely remembered the blond asking him to come over to his apartment, but Squall wasn't really sure of the reason for this request, nor why he had so willingly complied with it. His body was a disaster, his mind wasn't doing any better, really, and it was getting fairly late in the evening. Nevertheless, the thought of seeing Seifer provided a small speck of brightness in his world that had darkened a little more on this storm-ravaged night.

"..."

Without paying much attention to the process, Squall pulled a random long-sleeved shirt off a hanger and a pair of jeans off the shelf above it. He stuffed his dirty clothes into his laundry basket, then carefully placed Seifer's shirt back where he had found it, ensuring to hide it from plain sight. His legs felt shaky as he walked around to produce a fresh pair of boxers and some white socks from the dresser in his bedroom. The skin of his wrists was aching and itching beneath the bandages; he had used peroxide to clean them again, and he noticed some blood oozing through the white gauze. He had to suppress the urge to peel open the bandage and scratch at his skin to find some relief from the pain.

'_I guess I... overdid it... maybe just a little bit... It shouldn't be bleeding this much.'_

He shoved the discomforting notion aside and slowly got dressed, and he was thankful that the act of putting on his clothes didn't require much thought. His brain felt numb, and he almost would've preferred to keep it that way; it made the task of _existing_ so much easier to deal with. His hair was damp and his room was still freezing, despite the fact that he had closed the window before taking a shower. His skin still didn't feel clean, even after scouring himself with a sponge, bodywash and hot water for nearly twenty minutes. Considering the circumstances, however, he really couldn't do much else.

In the end, no soap in this world would ever wash away what Kato had done to him.

Squall walked over to his aluminum nightstand and slid open one of the drawers. Inside, he found the silver necklace with the lion pendant that he had taken off as soon as he had returned from work that evening and realized that nobody but his stepfather was home. Keeping the necklace safe was like a ritual to him... another small obsession of his that kept his world turning every day. He'd never allow Kato to dirty the gift that had been given to Squall by his mother and sister. With hands that almost weren't steady enough, the brunette laced the silver chain around his neck and fastened the clasp, before sliding the necklace beneath his shirt. The metal felt cool against his skin, and in some way, that sliver of sensation comforted him more than the act of cutting himself ever would.

As he sat down on his office chair to put on his black leather boots and tie the laces, he wondered when the thunderstorm had faded. It was still dark and drizzling rain outside, but he could no longer hear thunder, nor see lightning. The silence was almost eerie, but he could appreciate it, if only for its absence of Kato's breathing.

Kato...

His consciousness reeled as he tried to keep himself from remembering what was still so raw and fresh in his memory. Under his breath, he sang the gentle melody of the lullaby that his mother had always chanted to him as a child – the same lullaby that sounded so strikingly similar to the one Seifer had hummed to him once when he had been sobbing in the blond's arms after injuring his shoulder.

_"Dream by night... wish by day... Love begins this way... Loving starts when open hearts... touch and stay..."_

The older he had grown and the more he had seen of life – how unforgiving and extravagantly _cruel_ it could be – the more difficult it was for him to remember the whole of the song's lyrics. When he was a child, his mother would always calm him with that song when he would wake in tears in the middle of the night, torn from his slumber by nightmares of giant dragonflies and faceless monsters that wanted to eat his soul. The precious image of her slender frame perching over him protectively with a gentle smile lit by the light of a candle on his nightstand continued to dull a little more each day. He knew that, eventually, he would lose the memory entirely and trade it for one far less pure and kind, and that thought scared him more than anything else in his life ever had.

And yet, despite the many years that had flown by... despite the innocence he had lost and the scars he had acquired... even the smallest, most broken fractions of his mother's lullaby still managed to calm the storm in Squall's heart.

Because when everything was said and done, he was still nothing more than a child.

Standing up, his face set and he ceased singing as he walked over to his couch and grabbed a pair of his leather wristbands off the coffee table. He slung them around his narrow limbs and yanked at the buckles, swallowing several times against the pain that the sudden pressure induced upon his open wounds. His vision blurred and wavered oddly before his eyes, like a kaleidoscope that had been spun much too quickly.

'_Ugh... Calm down... It's alright. Just hold still for a second and breathe... It'll get better... It will...'_

He was well aware that his body needed time to replenish the blood it had lost, but he wasn't willing to sit down, twiddle his thumbs and nurse his injuries as he knew that he should have. He didn't have the time, the patience, or the respect for his own health. Instead of tending to his ailments, he waited a minute for his vision to steady, then shrugged into his black motorcycle jacket, zipped it up to his throat, jerked on a set of tight leather gloves and clutched his helmet under his right arm.

'_... I've gotta get the fuck outta here. I really don't care what it takes.'_

It wasn't the first time he had bailed abruptly after one of his stepfather's abusive episodes. Kato had gotten what he wanted... for tonight, at least, Squall's family members would be safe and guarded from his volatile temper. The brunette didn't think that the man would suspect anything if he took off on his motorcycle, because quite honestly, Kato had never cared much where and how Squall spent his time, as long as his body was frequently accessible to him. When Squall tried to avoid him for too long, however, Kato would get irritated, and things only got worse from there on; the brunette had learned this through experience.

Gnawing on his bottom lip until he could feel the taste of something bittersweet and metallic on the tip of his tongue, Squall quickly flung his bedroom door open. He didn't stop during his approach of the stairway, knowing that his stepfather was probably in his private office, which was located on the same floor as his bedroom. At this point, the brunette had no nerve for any further confrontation with the man.

As Squall fled down the steps with a grim, determined expression, he had to grab on to the long, narrow handrail in order to maintain his already unsettled balance. His heart was beating noticeably against his ribcage, and his devious body was trying to coax him into slowing down by sending fresh waves of pain to his head, but none of that was going to stop him.

He didn't care if he'd collapse out on the street or anyplace else, as long as it wasn't _here_, in this godforsaken house, in the presence of a man who had a soul as dark as the storm clouds outside. As long as there was still a spark of life left in him, Squall Leonhart would never succumb to physical pain or weakness in front of his stepfather, nor to the natural desire to break down and cry that even the proud brunette felt every once in a frightening while.

Finally, the seventeen year old had reached the foyer. He crossed the marble floor on wobbly legs, cringing at the squeaking noise that the rubber soles of his boots produced on the precious stone surface. Only after he had unlocked and opened the front door in one hasty motion, stepped through it in stride and thrown it shut again behind himself, did he finally allow himself to breathe.

The soft, hardly noticeable drizzle of rain felt dewy as it melted into his skin. The air was heavy and cool as it caressed his tight, aching lungs, easing the tension that was like chains of iron wrought around his inner organs. He savored that merciful sensation of relaxation for a moment, and he stood still long enough to let the feeling of confinement induced by this house evaporate from his bones.

For just one brief, fleeting moment, he almost felt free.

He watched the outside lanterns of the house reflected in the water that slicked the ground for a minute, fascinated by the lazy play of light. Then, he smoothed his wet hair behind his ears and raised his gaze to the coal-black sky that was still heavily arched with rain clouds. He figured that the storm would rise once more before too long, and he knew better than to be on the road when it would strike.

With a sigh, he dropped his head.

'_I guess I better get going.'_

When he carefully made his way around the wooden porch, past the birdbath he had bought for his mother and across the pavement to their ridiculously large six-car garage, he enjoyed the sound of water splashing lightly as he stepped through countless shallow puddles. Of course, driving under these tricky weather conditions would be somewhat troublesome, but it wasn't the first time he'd ridden his bike in the rain.

Besides, with a name like 'Squall', he figured that he had no business being afraid of a brewing storm, anyhow.

'_I never understood why Mom gave me this name,' _he pondered aimlessly as he continued to walk down the wide flagstone path to the garage. _'Raine... Squall... Where did all this weird fascination with water come from, anyway? It must have started with my grandparents, obviously, since they were the ones who named her Raine. Yeah... Not that I could ever ask **them**, or anything. I don't even know their names. Tche. How ironic, huh... Considering all this craziness, I guess it's really no surprise that Mom hooked up with... **him**. Son of a bitch. I don't know **his** name, either. I can't believe some random asshole is partly the reason I exist. Maybe I should thank him some day. Then again, I doubt I could think of any gesture that's painful enough to demonstrate the full extent of my... gratitude.'_

He frowned sinisterly as he remembered things he would've rather forgotten or never known in the first place. He found it almost amusing that his life had already been a complete disaster before he'd even been born. He liked to blame his 'father' for this, although he had to admit that things were a lot more complicated than that. After all, the careless man hadn't been the only one who had never wanted for Squall to be brought into this world.

'_Why am I even thinking about this...? It's been over seventeen goddamn years. Nothing is going to change what happened, and she replaced him a long time ago. Her latest choice might not have been any wiser, but it's not her fault. She just... she... Ugh, whatever. I have better things to do with my time than think about this bullshit.'_

Straightening up and shaking off all thoughts about his mother and 'father', Squall finally entered the garage through a wide side door, and he exited with his bike that very same way. He didn't want to bother with opening the garage door or maneuvering past his mother's Mercedes Benz and his stepfather's black Porsche 911 and silver Jaguar; just the sight of them alone made him sick to his stomach, and by god, he'd seen enough revolting things for the night.

It took him mere seconds to strap on his helmet, sit up and open the front gate of the house with his remote control, which he kept in a pocket of his jacket. They had a security system and a camera installed at the entrance, but he no longer cared if Kato saw him leaving the premises. At this point, it was too late for the man to do anything about his departure, anyway, if he even felt inclined to do so at all.

As Squall sped off through the quiet neighborhood and towards the freeway, he wondered if he would manage to find Seifer's apartment on his own. He had brought his cell phone, just in case, but he didn't feel like calling and asking the blond for directions. He figured that if he _didn't _succeed in finding the apartment complex, he'd at least be able to enjoy a solitary ride in the beautifully cold evening air.

... Although to some extent, he almost longed for Seifer's company.

'_... Like hell.'_

His hand clenched angrily around the throttle. With a sharp grimace that was hidden behind the visor of his helmet, he proceeded quickly onto the onramp to the freeway. While he was driving and brooding grumpily, he told himself that he certainly wasn't planning on staying long at Seifer's place, or making the act of visiting him a habit. At the same time, he did kind of want to know what the blond had been so damned excited and secretive about on the phone.

'_I wonder what he's up to. Knowing him, it's probably something totally fucked in the head.'_

About fifteen minutes into his lonesome ride, he could slowly start to feel the night's horrors taking their toll on him as his strength gradually sapped away. He knew he should've expected something like this to happen, but he hadn't anticipated that the weakness induced upon him by the emotional trauma and the blood loss would catch up with him this quickly. He found that he had a hard time concentrating on the rain-slicked roads, which were glimmering softly under the street lights. Unfortunately, the wet asphalt made deceleration something that was much more easily said than done. His wrists were still burning spitefully, and his head was spinning in protest whenever he dared to move his neck too far to the right or left. He realized that the fact that his vision wasn't as clear as usual should have concerned him, but that would've meant admitting how much he was really hurting, and this was simply not an option.

'_Dammit. Almost there... It can't be far now...'_

He didn't know how long he had been riding, but when he had finally located the freeway exit to Seifer's place and expertly backtracked his way to the other boy's snobbish apartment complex, Squall felt as if he had been sitting on his bike for days. His body was aching in a cornucopia of unimaginable places, and he really wanted nothing more than to get off his bike, curl up on the ground and go to sleep, but a spark somewhere in Squall's stubborn mind kept him going. His gaze roved aimlessly around the parking lot as he slowly rode along, and when he had finally located Seifer's truck, he pulled in sideways behind it.

Squall slowly turned off his engine, but he didn't remove his fingers from the motorcycle's handlebars. He doubled over to take a few shallow, ragged breaths, and his hands began to cramp around the grips in a painful rhythm.

'_Hurts... it... hurts... Shit... Damn... damn all this... Bastard... why did he have to... ugh...'_

It took him a few minutes of slow, deliberate breathing to gather his composure and fend off the hurt and the memories of what had come to pass in his bedroom that night. Very gradually, he slid off his bike, trying to ignore the feeling of his body falling apart on the inside. The ground beneath his feet didn't seem steady at all, but he figured that this was just his imagination. As he stood on the concrete pavement, he removed his helmet and stared at Seifer's red pick-up out of glazed, unseeing blue orbs.

'_Seifer's truck... I can't believe... we went to the Alclad together in that thing... and that he wants to go to that stupid dance... Shit... What was I **thinking**...?'_

He closed his eyes for a moment, allowing the image of Seifer asking him to the dance to resurface. He didn't regret the fact that he had said 'yes', but he wondered whether he hadn't taken on more trouble than he'd be able to manage. He didn't really want to stand Seifer up, but he still hadn't figured out how to keep the dance a secret from Kato, and he knew that he was running out of time. He didn't think that the man would lose his temper just because Squall hung out with Seifer, but for the two of them to go to a goddamn _dance_ together... it was more obvious of a move than Squall would ever deem prudent.

'_But Kato isn't here **now**... He doesn't scare me. There is nothing he can do.'_

Still clutching his helmet in his left hand, Squall defiantly lifted his eyes to search the façade of the building. He saw the staircase that he had ascended once under Seifer's watchful gaze, and he recalled that the blond's apartment was located somewhere on the second floor.

'_I don't remember his apartment number. I guess it doesn't matter... It can't be that hard to find.'_

He brought his right, gloved hand to his temple and brushed back a few single, dark brown tendrils. His hair was even more tousled than usual, since he hadn't bothered to do anything more than towel-dry it after his shower. He never used a blow-dryer, anyway, although it probably would've been the smart thing to do, considering the weather and how poorly he was already feeling, anyway.

Well, "Whatever," he snorted. If anything was going to kill him, it certainly _wouldn't _be his wet hair.

With a mute sigh, he walked towards the stairwell. He didn't appreciate the fact that his legs felt like half-set jelly as he climbed up the stairs, holding on to the metal railing for balance. He could ignore the fact that he was as tired as a pack mule, but he couldn't really shut out the crushing ache in his lower abdomen, no matter how hard he tried. Every step he took caused the raw skin on his insides to feel like open, blistering burns. His headache still hadn't lessened, and all of a sudden, the idea of showing up at Seifer's doorstep in his current state didn't strike him as such a brilliant plan anymore.

'_He's not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but at this rate, even **he** might notice something. ... No, bullshit, I'm just getting paranoid. It can't be **that **obvious. I'm just a little dizzy, that's all. I made it here, right? As long as I pull myself together, it'll be fine. He won't notice a damn thing.'_

As if to convince himself (rather than Seifer), Squall pushed back his shoulder blades and let go of the handrail. He only had one more floor to go, and he'd be damned before he clung to this bitch for support.

'_There we go, made it. Cake walk. Now, I just have to find his place. Hmph... That looks like it over there, I think...'_

When he had finally reached the second floor and spotted what he believed to be Seifer's apartment, Squall stared at the carefully stained wooden door out of eyes that had suddenly been shadowed by insecurity. Out of nowhere, he was once again overcome by the unsettling and nagging question of why he was here – why he had come all this way. What was he trying to accomplish by visiting Seifer so late in the evening? What the hell was he looking for here, anyway? He knew how much he was putting at stake. This whole thing was a stupid, _stupid_ fucking idea. Was he really willing to risk everything he had achieved and endured in order to be close to Seifer, even though he knew full well that – regardless of either of their efforts or feelings – their story would _never_ have a happy ending?

'_I... don't know.'_

All he knew was that he had never believed in happy endings to begin with.

Slowly, he trudged up to the door. He looked at the silver plated numbers on the wooden surface, reading '225', but he couldn't recall seeing those digits before. He tightened the grasp around his helmet as he looked around, scanning the other apartments that were in his field of vision. He lacked the confidence to simply bang on the door and find out who was inside, so he continued to twist his gaze around nervously, searching for a familiar sight.

'_This looks like it... but I don't know... I don't really remember. All the doors look the same. It could be **any **of them. Fuck. What should I do...?'_

Fortunately, he didn't have to walk around knocking on every door and making a fool out of himself, because his attention was suddenly attracted by a series of loud barks coming from inside the apartment that was right in front of him.

'_Huh? Hey... that's a dog. Shiva...?'_

He hesitated for a moment, trying to categorize that noisy bark, which gradually ascended to a more urgent, demanding pitch.

'_Hm... It sounds like her, but I'm really not sure. Shit, it might be some crazy freak's combat dachshund or someth—'_

Caught in his thoughts, Squall let out a small, startled yelp when the door in front of him was unexpectedly yanked open towards the inside of the apartment and he found himself face-to-face with a tall, broad-shouldered male who towered him by at least four or five inches.

A very _vocal_ male, no less.

"Shut the _hell_ up already! God _damn_! Dumbass mutt... I _know_ he's here, alright? Christ, what is it with you never shutting your fuckin' loud ass trap?"

Squall raised his left eyebrow and stared in bewilderment at the brawny blond teen that had appeared in the doorway before him, brandishing a wooden cooking spoon in the general direction of a large, gorgeous Alaskan Malamute, which the brunette recognized instantly as Shiva. It wasn't so much the sudden _sight_ of Seifer that baffled Squall, though, but rather the eye-blighting vision of the blond wearing a bright pink _apron_ with a 'Hello Kitty' image on the front and purple ruffles along the hems. To complete the outrageous look, Seifer was also donning a red-and-white bandana with an intricate black skull-and-crossbones embroidery and a distinct smell of booze to the sturdy cotton fabric.

He looked like a gay pirate queen if Squall had ever seen one.

'_What in all fucking **hell**...?'_

As Squall gaped at the absurd sight in what could only be described as stunned incredulity, Seifer finally turned from facing the living-room to greeting his perplexed visitor instead.

With a naughty glare in his eyes as he leaned coolly against the doorframe, Seifer flashed a nonchalant grin and leered, "Wassup, kitten? Holy shit, and here I was thinking you were never gonna make..."

The moment when Seifer's deep, baritone voice abruptly trailed off was the moment when Squall saw the blond's carefree face changing. The cocky smirk on Seifer's lips fell, and after a second of simply staring at Squall out of dumbstruck green eyes, the blond suddenly pushed himself away from the door and swiftly stepped up to the dark haired boy who was loitering in front of him.

"_Squall_!" Seifer exclaimed animatedly, and Squall didn't like the strange, almost frightened coloring to his voice. "What the fuck _happened_?"

Blinking, Squall took a surprised step backwards when Seifer grabbed the sides of his face and neck with both hands.

"Uh, wha—"

"You look like _shit_!" the older boy observed bluntly, and he tilted Squall's jaw upwards with his thumbs as he brought their faces closer together.

"What are you talking about?" Squall bristled reluctantly, trying to turn his head and shove Seifer away. "Hey, get the fuck outta my face, will you? I'm fine!"

"Uh, you fuckin' _shitting_ me? Have you taken a look in the mirror lately? Your eyes are all dark and bloodshot and puffy, and you're white as a fuckin' _ghost_! You..." Seifer paused and searched Squall's dark blue eyes with a very attentive gaze. "You look like you've been crying..."

"Bullshit," Squall snapped, finally succeeding in slapping the annoying teen's hands aside. "Don't be an idiot, and quit _touching _me! I'm fine. Besides, who are you to talk? What's with the 'Hello Kitty' freak show you're putting out?"

"A gift from Selphie," Seifer explained absent-mindedly, flapping his right hand in annoyance, before his expression darkened. "And don't think you can get off the hook _that_ easily. I wanna know what's wrong. You look like ass, Squall."

"Thanks," the brunette snarled sarcastically, snapping his head to the side.

"I'm not kidding."

"I _know_, alright? It's nothing," the brunette shot back more irritably now. "I just didn't get any sleep last night, that's all."

"Why not?" Seifer demanded.

Making a grimace as he stared the stubborn blond down, Squall hissed aggressively, "... Look, do you _want_ me to leave, or what? I didn't come here to discuss my fucking sleeping habits with you!"

Seifer frowned at the impulsive boy, who looked so frail and breakable standing there before him, in the warm amber light shed by his living room lamps. He was wearing his usual bad boy biker attire and some dark blue jeans that were loose on his paper-thin body. He stood gracefully, but stiff. His skin was as pale as a blank sheet of canvas, his eyes red, tired and unusually dull.

Perhaps he wasn't as fragile as he looked, but he wasn't nearly as tough as he acted, either.

Something wasn't right.

"... Come in."

For a moment, Seifer fully expected the brunette to turn around and leave. However, to Seifer's relief, Squall wordlessly followed his awkwardly spoken command and stepped past him inside the apartment. Squall's face was tight, and his hair looked like it was drenched as he walked by.

"Why is your hair all wet?" Seifer asked as he closed the door behind Squall and watched how Shiva anxiously greeted their visitor by jumping on her hind legs and placing her front paws on the brunette boy's chest. With an annoyed sigh, the blond ordered, "Shiva, hey... knock it off."

Squall dropped his helmet and gloves on the floor and started to cuddle Shiva, grateful for the distraction. He rubbed the top of her beautiful head and scratched her ears, grinning almost carelessly. He murmured words that Seifer couldn't understand, but which sounded gentle and almost melancholic to his ears.

"Squall," the blond finally repeated, folding his arms before his chest.

"What?" the brunette sniped, his voice sharper than the edge of a butcher's knife as he glared at him from over his shoulder.

Seifer merely rolled his eyes.

"Why the hell is your hair all fuckin' wet?" Seifer asked again, suspicion draped all over his tone. "It looks _soaked_."

"Because it's raining," Squall explained flatly. He looked at Seifer as if the blond was as dumb as a rock.

"It stopped raining over an hour ago," Seifer retorted.

"Not where I live."

Watching Squall as he squatted on the floor to rub Shiva's belly after she had flopped down to lay on her side, Seifer figured that the brunette probably had a point. His jacket looked wet, and so did his jeans and boots. Of course, that didn't exactly make the state of him any better.

"Oh, for fuckin' cryin' out loud."

Sighing audibly, Seifer walked past his guest into the bathroom. Striding back out into the room, he threw a soft, dark blue terry cloth towel into Squall's face, who accredited the playful gesture with a surprised hiss.

"Dry yourself off," Seifer ordered almost paternally. "You'll catch a cold, ya know."

_..:: "You'll catch a cold." ::.._

When that memory flickered through Squall's mind, Seifer saw a strange gleam come alight in the brunette's grey-blue eyes, but he didn't really know what to make of it. When the dark haired boy simply continued to sit on the floor, glaring at him with almost childish defiance, Seifer threatened slyly, "What? You want me to do it for you? I'll be happy to oblige. Hand me the towel and put your head in my lap, buttercup. You're in for a wild ride."

"Don't you dare fucking touch me, perv," Squall warned, but despite his reluctance, he took the hint and finally stood up with the towel in hand to rub his hair in slow, controlled movements.

Seifer couldn't know that every time Squall moved, his world tilted like a sinking ship. He shivered, and he was feeling sick to his stomach. Still, he tried not to let Seifer notice a thing.

"There ya go, kitten. See, not so bad, was it?" the oblivious blond praised him for his compliance, before trudging into the kitchen. "By the way, I've got a hairdryer in the master bathroom. Go use it, then explain to me why in the world you look like someone chewed you up and spit you back out."

"Fuck you."

"Well, I was _planning_ on wining and dining you first, but if you insist..."

"... What?"

Seifer peeked around the kitchen bar with a metal spatula and a bottle of smoke flavoring in his hand, smirking at the reserved brunette who was still standing in the entryway of the living room, circled by a very excited Alaskan Malamute.

"I'm making dinner," Seifer explained proudly, his chest swelled, but then he scratched his head and gestured vaguely with the spatula as he blew out a breath. "It's a good thing you're late, 'cause, uhh... let's just say things didn't quite go as _planned_."

"... What did you set on fire?" Squall asked cynically, clutching his hand to his hip and shifting his weight onto one foot.

"Nothing!" the proud blond bristled, mocking outrage over Squall's sinister grimace. "Jeez, you just have no faith in me, do you? You hurt my delicate feelings, ya know!"

Squall sneered and rolled his eyes. "Right. If I ever decide to give a fuck about your 'delicate feelings', I'll let you know. Besides, something smells _burnt_."

"Eh, yeah. Uhm... That'd be the steak."

"_Steak_?"

"Yep, but don't worry, you won't go hungry in this house - I bought a few extra slabs of meat to practice on."

"A _few_?" Squall clipped, sneering softly. "Define 'a few'."

"Well, uh... _sixteen_, to be exact," Seifer admitted reluctantly. "Let's just save the technicalities for later, shall we?"

"... I didn't know you were having dinner," the brunette murmured after a short pause, his expression suddenly distant. "I could've waited and come by later after you were finished..."

"Heh? 'Finished'? What in the _hell_ are you talking about? _We _are having dinner, cupcake, alright, that's 'we' as in you _and_ me," Seifer drawled, clicking his tongue. "Honestly, I didn't know you were _this_ fuckin' slow. I mean, what did you think I was gonna do with sixteen steaks all by myself, anyway? Dress myself in raw meat and go streakin' in the park or some whacked shit like that?"

"No, but... You didn't say anything about dinner on the phone!" Squall argued stubbornly, his cheeks glowing red as he crossed his arms in front of himself.

"It was supposed to be a surprise, duh," the blond sighed dramatically. "Well, shucks... so much for that."

Squall gave him an odd look, but said nothing. His eyes were burning with emotions that Seifer could not place.

"It's all good, go dry your hair. I still have to finish setting the table and cook the _dessert_," Seifer finally snickered suggestively. "Hope you like it hot and sweet, cupcake."

"Dessert? But—"

"Hair. _Now._"

Squall would've thrown something at the annoying teen, hadn't it been for his lack of ammunition and the fact that Seifer's head had already submerged safely behind the counters. He hated it when the blond spoke to him like an overprotective parent would to an irresponsible child, although deep down, he was mature enough to appreciate Seifer's concern.

Besides... after the way his stepfather had treated him and _pretended_ to be worried about his health, any genuine compassion offered to him by another human being was more meaningful to Squall than he would've ever been capable of putting into words.

With a quiet sigh of resignation, Squall eventually unzipped his jacket and slipped out of the tight leather, then bent down to pick up his gloves and helmet from the floor. He almost let out a scream, however, when he suddenly felt a sharp spike of pain in the left side of his head. It felt like a rusty corkscrew that had been stabbed into his brain, and he clutched his temple as his vision faded dangerously.

'_Sh-shit, ugh... my g-god... fuck... what's going... ugh...'_

Miraculously, he managed not to make a sound, but that accomplishment in itself drained almost all of his willpower. With a painfully contorted face, he swaggered to the side to drop his helmet, jacket and gloves onto a dresser somewhere by Seifer's front door. He held onto the wooden piece of furniture for a minute, trying to straighten up, but his head just wouldn't stop spinning no matter how hard he wished that it would. His stomach was heaving in response, and there was a bitterly sweet, acidic taste in the back of his throat. Throwing up here and now, he realized, would be a bad idea. Seifer was already suspecting something. He had to get out of this room, quickly. Wincing, he tried to keep his back turned to the kitchen as he decided to stumble in the direction of the bedroom, knowing that Seifer could re-emerge at any given time.

"You goin' to dry your hair or what, huh?" came a smooth, playful inquiry from behind the counters, only proving the brunette's concerns correct.

Squall flinched and retreated more hastily, murmuring a brittle "whatever" as he staggered through the living-room with practically no control over his motor functions. Despite his excruciating headache, his weird brain somehow took notice of the fact that the blond's place was a lot neater than it had been during his last visit – not just the bedroom, but the rest of the apartment, too.

'_W-why am I even... thinking... unh... ouch... Fuck...where's the... ugh... b-bathroom...?'_

Meanwhile, Seifer was pan-frying two steaks and stirring the contents of various pots in the kitchen, every now and then skimming over the propped-up cookbook that Selphie had picked out for him. They'd bought it together at the mall, and she had wisely selected the recipes for him (ranch salad, chili soup, cornbread, steak with vegetables and mashed potatoes, crème brulée), then explained each of them to him thoroughly, even going so far as scribbling directions and 'helpful' (disrespectful, more like it) cartoony images beside the ingredients lists in pink ink. He didn't know when the hell she had managed to buy the outrageous 'Hello Kitty' apron for him, but he assumed that it must've been at the time when she had claimed to be going to the 'bathroom'.

He figured that he should've been more suspicious, considering it had taken her nearly twenty minutes to pee and all.

In any case, this particular apron had miraculously found its way to the same holding rack as her ball gown when they had gone to pick it up at the end of their shopping spree. She had called it a "miracle," he had called it a "fucking curse from the gates of fucking hell". Nevertheless, he had promised her he would wear it tonight. As for the dress, Selphie planned on wearing it together with a set of yellow sandals that they had dug up at a fancy shoe store. All in all, Seifer had decided that the trip had been a success – he had acquired a spare key for Squall, new shoes, a pair of expensive khaki slacks and a dark green dress shirt from a posh men's outfitter.

Quite frankly, he expected to look smokin' hot at the dance, and he was planning on wooing the living daylights out of his frigid brunette date.

'_I'll make it a night he'll remember even after the last of his brain cells have gone into retirement. Mark my words, that night's gonna go down in **history**, baby!'_

He watched the steaks sizzling merrily in the pan as he hummed quietly to himself, trying to recall the lullaby he had sung to Squall not too long ago. It had been stuck in his head for days; his beloved grandmother, who was a spectacular singer, had always crooned that beautiful melody to him during his frequent visits to her house, and he sort of liked the idea of now being able to soothe his agitated friend with it – a person who was genuinely important to him.

_"Love, it seems, made flying dreams, so hearts could soar... Heaven sent, these wings were meant to prove once more... That love is the key, love is the key..."_

Smiling with a hypnotized, spacey glow in his eyes, he tapped the back pocket of his jeans, then generously doused the steaks with hickory marinade and smoke flavoring. Beads of searing hot liquid were fizzling and popping in the pan, and he backed away periodically with a curse on his lips when they struck his bare arms and cheeks. He was wearing a white t-shirt, long jeans and black, untied boots with his apron, and he believed his piratey-looking bandana to be quite a sexy accessory. After all, he _had_ noticed Squall giving him the old appreciative once-over.

'_Squall... what's he doing back there, anyway? Man, he looks like he hasn't slept in about two weeks. What the fuck's going on? Hey, and why am I not hearin' the fuckin' blow-dryer?'_

Frowning, he stopped humming that silly lullaby and listened more closely for the sound of his hairdryer.

He heard nothing.

"Squall?" he called, his tone slipping a few chords as he grew impatient. "Hey! You dryin' your hair or no—"

What his ears then picked up, however, was a sound of an entirely more violent magnitude than a simple blow-dryer could ever produce.

Seifer flinched and nearly dropped the spatula and the bottle of steak marinade he'd been holding when a sudden eruption of mad, high-pitched barking and howling sounded from the direction of his bedroom. Irritated, he stuck his head past the cabinets and yelled, "Yo, Shiva, shut _up_! Shiva! _Shiva_! Put a fuckin' _cork_ in it!", but her barking only ascended an even more earsplitting crescendo. Somewhere below him, his very proper and very intolerant neighbors were impatiently tapping the ceiling with their broomstick, or something along those lines.

"Yea, yea, _fuck_ _you _very much, too!" the blond spat roughly as he stomped his foot on the floor in insolence, before his bright green eyes irately swerved over towards the bedroom. "Fuck it, that's it. I've had it with that stupid dog!"

With an angry snarl, Seifer slammed the bottle of marinade down on the granite countertop and marched towards the bedroom. Frustrated, he yanked the bandana from his head and threw it across the room in a flash of a temper tantrum. He figured that Squall had probably locked himself inside the bathroom and Shiva was complaining outside about being separated from her new favorite human companion. After all, she had done the same thing to _him_ an annoying number of times.

'_Fuck, man, she can be such a whiny bitch sometimes, just like a goddamned woman! I can't believe I was dumb enough to pick a female fuckin' pupp—'_

He had stomped into the bedroom, the metal spatula still clutched like a weapon in his left hand, but his heated train of thought pretty much blew right past Sanity Station when his eyes fell on the dark haired figure that was leaning askew in the doorway to the master bathroom.

For one moment, time simply seemed to stop ticking.

Squall had his narrow back turned towards the living-room as he stood on bent, unsteady knees, and his left shoulder was connected with one side of the doorway; his right arm was outstretched and locked at the elbow, clutching the wooden frame for support. Seifer couldn't see his face, but even so, the blond _knew_ that something was terribly out of place.

Shiva was still barking, but at this point, Seifer could hardly even hear her anymore.

"Squall?" the blond asked as his pace slowed and his skin went cold with premonition. His words were swallowed by the earsplitting noise of Shiva's barking. Nervously, he listened for even the smallest of sounds coming from Squall's direction.

There was nothing.

"Hey... Squall, what's up? You okay?"

He tried to sound calm, but something was rushing in the back of his head. He received no response whatsoever to his inquisition from the other boy. His eyes narrowed as he hesitantly stepped closer, watching Squall's back with fierce intensity.

"... Squall?" he repeated, apprehension now kindling with his voice.

At this point, he was prepared for _anything_.

Suddenly, there was a forceful twitch of muscle that ran from the brunette's right shoulder all the way down his back, hips and his legs, which finally careened to the side with the slow, perverse gracefulness of a falling feather.

Seifer had to think no longer to know _exactly_ what this meant.

"_Shit_!"

He dropped the metal spatula without a thought, and with two hasty leaps, he was right by Squall's side. He barely managed to fling his arm around the brunette's torso before the brown haired boy's knees gave way and he came crashing down towards the bedroom floor.

"_Squall_!"

The dark haired biker collapsed against him with a groan, and Seifer had to yank him close in order to keep him from slipping through his hands and plummeting to the ground like a rock.

"S-Squall! Shit, what—"

Grunting helplessly, Seifer watched how the brunette's head fell back and lolled against him as he tried to steady Squall's limp body in an upright position.

"Hey, Squall! _Squall_! Look at me! Squall!" he continued to shout the brunette's name in panic. When Squall didn't react, Seifer quickly wrapped his arms around the other boy's back and legs, lifted him up and hurriedly carried him over to the bed, his heartbeat pounding in his throat.

He placed the younger teen on the mattress and immediately took a seat next to him, watching as Squall curled up on his right side. The brunette was facing in Seifer's direction, but his eyes were shut tightly as he let out choked gasps.

"Squall," Seifer repeated helplessly as he bent over his friend, his features dragged with intense and sickening worry. "Squall, what's wrong? C'mon, talk to me, what's going on? Snap out of it! Squall! Squall!"

Squall was clutching his cold, white hands to the sides of his head. When Seifer attempted to take a hold of his shoulder in order to steady him at least physically, the brunette shoved him away with astounding strength, screeching "Don't _touch_ me!"

The blond backed off with a shocked frown on his face, and he watched as Squall writhed on the bed, obviously trying to get a hold on his own body.

Seifer couldn't help but think that something about this scene was eerily familiar, but he had no time to ponder that notion any further.

"Squall, talk to me!" Seifer ordered grimly, and he carefully tried to grip the brunette's narrow shoulder again. This time, Squall offered no resistance. Speaking slowly and pointedly, Seifer asked, "What's the matter with you? Do you need a doctor? Squall? Do you want me to call 911? Talk to me!"

"No, just... leave me alone... ugh..." Squall panted, trying to stifle his own whimpers of pain as he pressed his hands over his face. Seifer's words were like white, painful noise under the rush of his own blood; it hurt to just try to understand him. "Go away..."

"Are you completely _insane_?" Seifer barked, frowning at the brunette. "Like _hell_ am I going anywhere with you being like this, idiot!"

Squall arduously looked up at the older boy past his hands, out of shadowed eyes that were narrowed to mere slits and glittered with tears. His skin looked colorless, and his teeth ground together behind parted lips as he pressed his fists against his temples as if he was trying to crush his own skull. He could hardly hear what Seifer was saying to him, the sound of blood pounding through his veins was that insanely loud. All he could do was stare at the close-up of Seifer's face, which looked so blurry, contorted and absurdly fucking gorgeous.

Squall just wanted to die of agony.

"I'm _fine_..." he cried, his lips trembling as he spoke and turned his gaze back to the mattress. "Just... ungh..."

"The fuck you are!" Seifer bit sharply, unnerved by the fact that Squall was honestly trying to make him believe he was okay. "Cut the crap and tell me what's going on!"

"Ugh..."

The blond searched his face with a long, intent look that stung with worry. "Is it your head?"

"I... yeah..." Squall admitted, shutting his eyes and exhaling through his mouth with a groan. "Ugh..."

"What is this? A migraine attack? Do you get migraines?" Seifer inquired, suddenly remembering that his mother would act similarly when one of her migraine episodes overcame her. Still, something about this was different.

"N-no... it..."

"Let me take a look at it."

"No, I—"

"Stop being so _fuckin'_ stubborn and let me see!"

Seifer pushed the brunette's hands aside and rolled the sporadically resistant boy onto his back. Squall's face was tight and twisted as it rested on the blond's pillow – Seifer could tell that he had to be in an exceptional amount of pain. Swallowing, he placed his own hands against Squall's temples, cupping them gently and attempting to soothe the dark haired biker just by the means of his cool, gentle touch alone.

He found that Squall's skin had never felt so warm to him.

"Shit... You're running a fever," he muttered in surprise, his brows furrowing in disapproval. "Why didn't you tell me you were sick? You're fuckin' burning up!"

"I'm... _not_," Squall pushed the words through his teeth by the means of mere willpower alone, because his strength had long left him. "It's... fine... just give me a minute. It's... getting better..."

"What's getting better? You haven't even really told me what's _wrong_!" the blond exclaimed in frustration.

"Just... it's just a headache... I'm feeling... lightheaded, that's all..." Squall groaned, turning his head to the side and resting his right forearm against his face. The overhead light in the bedroom was too bright; it was hurting his eyes. He wanted to be someplace dark, someplace cold... someplace without lights and people and sounds. These current surroundings felt far too real. He couldn't stand it, but that wasn't something he'd ever be able to admit to the other boy. "It's nothing..."

"You nearly passed the fuck out! Don't tell me it's _nothing_!" Seifer spat angrily, gesturing above the brunette's head. "Do you really think I'm _that_ fuckin' stupid? You look like you're hurt! Besides, what do you mean, 'lightheaded'? The fuck's up with that? That's not normal, you hear me? Something's up! You don't just feel lightheaded for no reaso—"

When Seifer's gaze slid from Squall's half-covered face to the exposed inside of the brunette's forearm, the blond abruptly fell silent.

Something struck him, struck him _hard_, and he could feel his own body going numb with realization.

"You didn't..." he whispered as a horrible sense of understanding flooded into his mind. His voice was flat and holding a deadly chill.

The boy laying before him swallowed and denied the meaning in Seifer's words. Silently, he shook his head as he placed his arm on his own chest and stared up at Seifer almost helplessly. Seifer, however, wouldn't be moved by the boy's pretty face or pleading eyes; calmly, he reached out and lifted Squall's arm to examine it more closely, and when he shot a quick glimpse at the other boy, he noticed that the brunette's pupils had contracted in silent, reflexive fear.

'_He's scared... Scared of **me**. Scared of... Shit...'_

Grimacing, Seifer pushed up Squall's shirtsleeve. The boy's veins looked so fragile and blue underneath his skin, which seemed as thin and lacerable as rice paper. Very slowly, Seifer worked on unclasping the buckle on Squall's wristband with his right hand, while continuing to steady the boy's limb with his left. Squall wasn't resisting Seifer's movements, but he also wasn't aiding the other boy with his task. As the heavy leather strap finally came undone and dropped into the blond's lap, Seifer let out a sharp, hollow gasp.

Emerald eyes bore into the sight of mottled, blood-stained gauze wrapped haphazardly around Squall's almost skeletal right wrist. Seifer's mouth went dry when he rubbed his thumb over the uneven surface of the bandage, confirming that it was still moist and the blood as fresh as it looked.

Squall's head turned to the side.

"You idiot," Seifer hissed, his voice tight as it lingered in the air, which had become heavy and laden with emotions. "You goddamn fucking stupid _idiot_!"

The dark haired boy flinched, but his eyes were blank and expressionless as he stared at the wall and drowned in the sound of blood rushing to his head once more. Seifer, who was still sitting on the edge of the bed, glared at Squall out of morbid green orbs that were dark with anger, hurt and frustration. He looked down at the boy as if he wanted to punch him, but there were tears of disbelief that had pearled along the line of his lower lashes.

"What's _wrong_ with you?" Seifer asked, trembling. "What the _hell_ is _wrong _with you? What? Just tell me, goddammit, _what_? What is the _fucking_ _MATTER _with you? You can't be this goddamn stupid! You _can't_ be! Tell me this is just a sick _fucking JOKE_! Tell me!"

Squall winced at the rawness in those words, but he refused to turn his head and look at the blond. He swallowed several times, trying not to cry or make a sound. His vision, however, had long become wet and blurred as he tried to bite back his tears, tried to hold them in just as he held in everything else.

Squall didn't put up a fight when Seifer let go of his right arm to uncover his left wrist instead. The blond was handling him roughly now – his movements were lacking gentleness and any form of consideration. When the wristband was removed from his limb and Seifer spat a curse, Squall's body went very still. His tears didn't fall, however, until he finally heard Seifer trying to speak with a voice that had been coated by purest, most heartfelt despair.

"You... you... just..."

Squall's eyes didn't leave the bedroom wall beside him. He could feel his own tears dripping across the bridge of his nose, melting into the pillow. There was a deep, slow burn in his throat that echoed in his heart. Above him, he could hear Seifer choking on his own sobs, and the blond's grip was bone-crushingly tight on his forearm. Squall had never seen the other youth so emotionally shook up, hadn't even thought it _possible_ for the arrogant, loud teen to look so hurt; Seifer wasn't even trying to hide the fact that he was crying.

The brunette swallowed.

He wasn't sorry.

He wasn't sorry.

He wasn't _sorry_.

But then why did it hurt so goddamn much? Why did he feel like all of this was his fault? Why did he feel like things could be different, if only he had tried a little bit harder?

"I... I d-didn't..." he started, every word thinner than air as he attempted to speak. His lips were too dry; they felt achy and worn, like parchment that had been handled too many times. Yet, he felt like he had to say this, even if his skin would crack and bleed as he spoke.

"S-Seifer... I didn't... try... to... kill myse—"

"Shut up," the blond above him cut him off, exhaling sharply as all softness was burnt from his inflection. "Just _shut up_."

"I..."

The brunette's voice broke, and he fell silent. '_Of_ _course_,' he thought silently to himself... he should have known that something like this was going to happen before long. He was so goddamn stupid. He couldn't fool the blond, and he would only insult him further if he continued to try. Seifer Almasy was a lot brighter than he had ever given him credit for; he wasn't very book-smart, but he was wise, and for the first time, Squall realized that Seifer's hard-earned wisdom and naturally astute instincts would ultimately ruin everything.

'_I'm so... stupid... How could I ever believe... he wouldn't notice... That I could just... walk in here, and... Ugh... I can't do anything right, can I...? I'm so... **fucked**...'_

For some absurd reason, his mouth curved into a small, hopeless smile that was a screaming testimony to the years of twisted agony that had forever distorted his sense of reality. Finally, his voice whispered a brittle, faltering "sorry" that rippled through his whole body until it was swallowed by his bloodstream.

By god, he was so very, very _sorry_.

Perhaps Seifer had seen his face that very moment, or perhaps he had simply sensed the profoundness of his anguish, because without warning, Squall suddenly found himself jerked from the mattress by the bones of his shoulders and crushed against the blond's chest, which was heaving sharply.

"W-what—"

"Don't tell me," the blond interrupted him once more, and Squall could feel Seifer's hot breath against his ear as he stared at the ceiling. "I don't wanna hear that you weren't trying... that you didn't... ugh... weren't_ trying_ to _kill_ yourself. Believe that I'm that blind, if you want, or that I'm really that goddamn stupid... but don't _ever_ think that I'd really sit here and watch you hurt yourself, you hear me? I don't _care_ about your intentions... whether you wanna commit suicide right now or kill yourself slowly over time is fuckin' irrelevant to me. What I care about is the _reason_ why you do this, and I care about the fact that you're _bleeding_ and that... that I... that I don't fuckin' know how to help you anymore..."

Squall stifled the helpless groan that threatened to break out of him when he heard those words and felt the tight grip of Seifer's arms around his body. What was he supposed to say, or do? He had nothing to explain. If he lied, he would only make things worse; if he didn't, he would risk the lives of loved ones that he cherished beyond anyone and anything.

'Anyone'...?

'_He's... not... he... oh, god.'_

When had Seifer stopped being 'anyone' and become someone who was worth more to Squall than his own happiness?

"Sh-shit..."

He buried his head against Seifer's shoulder, sobbing as the hopelessness of his situation fully struck him. He no longer even tried to control his ragged breathing pattern. He muttered senseless words that added up to nothing, and his hands clawed the back of Seifer's shirt to pull himself as closely into the blond as he possibly could. His feet shuffled across the sheets as he fought for leverage; their embrace was like a competition.

Inside, Squall's heart was breaking.

He loved this guy, and the very act of loving him would bring an end to _everything _he had fought for over the past years.

There was nothing Squall could do... nothing whatsoever. This was a battle he could only win by losing.

It hurt so goddamn much.

"Squall... hey..." Seifer tried, but even after fighting down the tears that tied his throat for several minutes, the blond still couldn't force his voice to hold. He felt like he was falling apart. He was sitting on his shins on the bed, wearing that stupid apron, clutching the boy who was bleeding on the outside, but dying on the inside.

What in the world was he supposed to do?

He didn't know how he would ever make Squall appreciate and value his own life. Hell, he couldn't even stop him from crying, so how could he ever prevent him from cutting himself again? He wanted to believe that he _could_, but in all truth, he had never felt more useless. What could _he_ do that nobody else had ever tried before him?

At this point, he could think of just one small and seemingly meaningless thing that could possibly make a difference.

_"You and I touch the sky... the eagle and the dove... Nightingales, we keep our sails filled with love... Ever strong, our future song, to sing it must be free... Every part is from the heart, and love is still the key... And love it seems made flying dreams to bring you home to me..."_

As Seifer sang in an unsteady, grated voice, Squall continued to cry against him. The brunette understood nothing. Why did they both know this lullaby? Why were they both here together? Why had they even been born? Maybe if he found the answers to these questions, he'd finally know what to do to make things right.

"..."

Right now, all he really knew was that he should have never showed up at the blond's doorstep, that he should have never let Seifer into his life, that he should have never allowed Kato to become so powerful and influential over his own and his family's destiny, and that he should have never... _never_...

"I... I wish I'd never... never been _born_..."

Seifer froze when he heard those desperately phrased words, and the rest of the lullaby immediately drained from his heart. He could feel Squall gripping his shirt, dragging his fingers across his skin as if he was scared of what would happen if he let go.

With rediscovered gentleness, the blond slowly worked on separating their bodies. Squall resisted, at first, but when he finally allowed Seifer to look him in the eyes, the eighteen year old found that he had never seen anything more heartbreaking. Despite his pride and bravado, the dark haired boy was sobbing like a child, and judging by the shadows under his eyes and the pallor of his skin, his body couldn't handle much more of this.

Perhaps he was closer to becoming a corpse and a memory than Seifer had ever realized.

"Don't say that," Seifer finally whispered with a sort of determination that he'd never quite felt before as he looked Squall straight in the eye. "Don't even _think_ that, you understand? I don't want that thought to cross your mind _ever _again."

"Why not?" Squall retorted bitterly, and more tears fell from his eyes as he shook his head, as if he didn't want to hear what Seifer had to say. The blond was holding him by his upper arms, but his grasp wasn't painful enough; Seifer was far too gentle and far too kind.

Somewhere, something inside Squall was breaking.

"Because it's an insult to yourself and your mother, who gave birth to you," Seifer growled. "And because... it fucking hurts to hear you say it."

"I'm nothing but a burden to everyone, what _difference_ does it make?" Squall snapped coldly as his head pitched back, but the anger in his voice was false and fragile, ready to fall apart at any given moment. "I'm doing everything wrong! My mom... she... she... ugh..."

Seifer immediately picked up on the strange, alarming coloring in Squall's tone. Carefully, he tilted his head and asked, "What? What about your mother?"

He watched how the brunette squirmed under his gaze for several moments, only to ultimately surrender and turn his head away once more. Seifer tried to force the boy to look at him again by firming his grip on Squall's arms just marginally, but the brunette refused meet his gaze for the longest time.

"Squall, what about your mother?" the older blond repeated sternly. "Come on, talk. Don't shut off on me. _Talk_."

Blue eyes were flashing at him now, and Seifer noticed a slight curl by the corner of Squall's lips. The brunette swallowed several times, and when he opened his mouth again, Seifer could almost tell that he had been wanting to say this to someone, _anyone_, for many years.

"My mother... she was... When I was born... she was all by herself, and she... I... she was only eighteen years old, you know... She... Nobody wanted me, nobody aside from her... She's the only one. They all just... didn't even..." Squall stammered, trying to rearrange his words and thoughts. Finally, he drew a breath, deep into his chest, and with eyes burning brightly with guilt, he said, "And they were right, you know? My mother was _my age_ when she got pregnant with me, okay? She was seventeen when she got pregnant, and eighteen when I was born! _Eighteen_, you hear me? I... I ruined her life! I ruined every dream she ever had!"

Seifer, who had already done the math on his own weeks ago, only smiled forgivingly at Squall's childish outburst and smoothed his thumb across the brunette's red, tear-stained cheekbones. Squall flinched, not understanding the gentleness behind the gesture.

"She was pretty young when she had you, huh?" Seifer noted softly, before he frowned at the shame that writhed Squall's features. "But what does that matter, anyway? Why do you feel so damn guilty about it? You ruined nobody's life, stupid. It was _her _decision, Squall, not your's. It's not like you had any say in it. You were born, and that was that. How was that ever your fault, huh? Nobody ever asked you what you wanted. Besides... I think your mother knew what she was doing. And trust me, I'm sure she doesn't regret for even one _second_ that she put you into this world. She's proud to be your mother, okay? She loves you, no matter how old she was or where your biological father might've run off to. I know you told me your old man was dead and all, but I get the feeling you just fed me some bullshit so I'd stop asking."

Squall stared, but said nothing, and from his silence and the stunned look in his eyes, Seifer got all the affirmation he had needed. Sighing, he released the brunette's arms and caressed the nape of his neck instead, wondering why Squall flinched and snapped his head to the side at the innocent touch.

"I'm guessing your mom raised you by herself, didn't she?" Seifer asked, and he wasn't surprised when Squall didn't answer. "She's a damn strong woman. Stop feeling sorry for her and be _proud _of her... and yourself. You've got nothing to be ashamed of. You're a smart kid, and you're a great older brother to your little sister. Have you ever noticed just how they _look_ at you? I _have_. Your family adores you, Squall. Ell would do anything for your approval and respect. She looks up to you like you're a goddamn deity. And your mother watches you with the kind of unconditional love of someone who'd lay down their _life _for you without thinking about it for even a second. Nobody else could ever replace you. If you'd just be gone one day, they'd never be happy again."

He pulled Squall's torso closer against him to brush his lips to the boy's left ear and whisper in a voice that was heavy with emotion, "And neither would I."

Squall stiffened, and the hands he had placed on Seifer's comforter tightened involuntarily beneath him.

"W-what...?" he asked, choking on the word.

The blond chuckled softly at Squall's shocked inflection and crooned, "You're hopeless. Man, I really thought you'd have figured it out by now..."

"But... what..."

"Ah, jeez. What do I have to do so that you finally get it, huh? There are people who _care _about you, alright, and I happen to be one of them," Seifer declared with mock impatience, and when he separated their bodies just slightly, he carefully raised one of the brunette's wrists to his face. He tried not to frown at the disturbing sight, although he couldn't quite manage.

He figured that he couldn't be blamed.

"That's why you gotta stop doing this, okay? If you keep this shit up, you _will_ get yourself killed," he chided him grimly, before his voice became sorrowful and distant. "Just look at yourself... you shouldn't even have been driving tonight."

Seifer watched the dark haired teen's eyes focusing on some spot on his t-shirt, somewhere by his heart. Squall's arms were lax against his sides, his legs pushed up against Seifer's thighs. He looked like a little boy... lost, scared... out of places to hide and excuses to make. For some reason, Seifer knew that he could only help his friend by keeping him in this unguarded, powerless position, where he was forced to face his demons and accept them for what they were. His understanding of the brunette's state of mind was rudimentary at best, but at this point, he didn't know what else to do.

He, too, had run out of excuses.

"What... am I supposed to do?" Squall finally asked quietly. His words sounded weak and drained as he spoke, and his head hardly lifted.

"Stop cutting yourself. Stop treating your body like it's your enemy," Seifer advocated passionately, not skipping one beat. "Don't hurt yourself anymore. You're gonna kill yourself if you don't stop, whether you mean to or not."

"It's not..."

"It's not what?"

The brunette lowered his eyes. His voice was a whisper, harsh to his own ears. "... It's not that simple."

"I'm aware of that, but when everything's said and done, this is about as simple as it's gonna get," Seifer explained, trying to remain patient with the boy in his embrace. Still, it felt as if somewhere inside him someone was slowly plucking a chord, over and over again, and he was starting to grow very tired of the nagging tone. It was becoming too much, and he could barely stand it anymore. He was trying to help, but it was difficult to offer assistance to a boy who had spent his whole life refusing it. Somehow, he realized that words would never convey how much Squall meant to him, and how much he was truly worried. "I'm serious. This is crazy, Squall... you've gotta _stop _cutting yourself! Just _stop_..."

"You can't ask that of me," Squall murmured, biting the inside of his cheek as he stared at his own, mutilated wrists, then at Seifer's healthy ones that had never been touched by a blade or a bandage before. Seifer would never understand how he felt... how he _hurt_.

"I _can_ and I _am_," Seifer stated brusquely, and something in his inflection caused Squall to look up and narrow his eyes. "In fact, if you don't stop it, then I'll..."

"You'll _what_?" Squall finished, the question almost sounding like a warning. His pupils had become as sharp as pinpoints, and he gradually scooted away from Seifer, backing off against the headboard of the bed.

Seifer reciprocated Squall's challenging gaze silently and watched him withdrawing himself, doing nothing to interfere, unsure on whether he should go on.

"Squall, listen, you..." he murmured, attempting to steer the conversation into more peaceful waters. Finally, he let out a sigh of defeat. "Look... I just want to—"

"No," Squall cut him off harshly. "This has _nothing_ to do with you!"

"Yes, it does," Seifer objected persistently.

"No! It never had _anything _to do with you! You aren't the reason it started, and you won't be the reason it ends!"

"Why not?"

"Because," the brunette started, a flicker of insecurity crossing his face as he looked away. "... Because you can't be."

"Why?"

"Because it's not that goddamn _easy_!" Squall spat exasperatedly, trembling with deeply seated frustration.

Why couldn't Seifer just leave him the fuck alone? Was he not _listening_? What was so difficult to understand? For a second, Squall wondered if his own words somehow sounded different to Seifer and everyone else's ears than they did to his own, because he thought that he had really been quite clear...

This was nobody's burden or business but his _own_.

"... I'm going to leave," Squall declared abruptly, sounding drained and quiet. He felt like he needed to lay down and just sleep for decades.

Why did being in the blond's company always wear him out so much?

"Why?" Seifer asked, fixating him with his eyes.

"Because I want to."

"No, you don't," the older boy replied evenly, his voice free of even the smallest speck of doubt.

His confidence angered Squall.

"Fuck you, alright! You don't know what I want!" the brunette shot back, his tone cold and irritated now. His gaze twitched around the room, avoiding Seifer's eyes. His flight instincts were kicking in.

"Maybe so, but I do know that running away isn't going to solve anything. I really thought you – of all damn people - would have figured that out by now."

"..."

And then, for a long while, there was nothing but silence.

Apparently, Squall didn't have anything suitable to say to Seifer's thrifty comment. No cocky comebacks, no irate insults... just stale, finely grated silence that Squall refused to weave his way out of.

Well, it served Seifer just fine.

"Listen, Squall, I know it's not easy, okay?" the blond continued, his tone low and smooth and deliberately comforting. "Nothing about this was _ever_ easy, but I refuse to accept that there isn't anything I can do to help you through this. I don't care what you say — I am _not_ going to sit here and watch you fuck yourself up."

Squall's lips thinned as he breathed frostily, "Then don't. I'm not asking you to stick around."

"What is your _problem_? Can't you take _anyone's_ help?" Seifer growled in a harsh voice, gesturing angrily in frustration before he grabbed Squall's arm above the wrist and yanked him closer. The brunette eyed him warily, but he didn't pull back or offer any physical resistance to Seifer's hectic touch. He yielded to it, quietly, studying Seifer's reaction. "This isn't a _joke_, you hear me? This isn't about being a smartass or who's got the last fuckin' word!"

The other boy swallowed.

"I know that," he answered throatily.

"No, you don't, and that's exactly the issue here," Seifer huffed. "You don't give a shit at all, neither about yourself or anyone else! You just do your own thing and the rest of us sorry fuckers just have to deal!"

"Don't be so full of yourself! You don't have any fucking right to talk to me like this," Squall sniped acidly, and his eyes glittered with pride as he gave his arm a token tug.

"Oh, yeah? Considering we're practically _dating_, I dare disagree," Seifer snarled.

Squall snorted arrogantly. "We're _not_ dating, jackass!"

"We're not?" the older teen drawled with much precision to each word, before tilting his head in a very calculated manner. "What _are_ we, then? Huh? Do enlighten me, please."

"You... we... we're..." Squall muttered, fidgeting with the sentence for a while until his gaze dropped to his lap in resignation.

"Be careful you don't say something you'll regret later," Seifer warned. "I'd hate to see you all sorry and apologizing to me again."

The brunette's head flicked up at the mock, eyes glaring.

"You basta—"

"Yeah, yeah, I've heard it all before," Seifer cut him short impatiently. He waved his free, left hand, no direction to the sweeping movement. Then, he spontaneously brought his palm down in a smooth arch to Squall's face where it came to a rest against the brunette boy's ear and temple. Drawing a breath, Seifer forced gentleness back into his tone. "Look, Squall... Maybe you're right. Maybe I don't know you... maybe we're not dating. But aside from all that, I want you to ask yourself one thing: Would you sit by and watch how _I _cut myself?"

The anger vanished from the clear surface of Squall's dark blue eyes, and he stared back at Seifer, looking positively stumped.

"W-what?" he stuttered, before he caught himself. "_No_! No, I wouldn't!"

"Why not?"

"Because, you... I... I..." Squall whispered, biting his tongue as he squirmed, before he simply fell silent.

Seifer regarded the other youth with a grim, but smug smile and he lowered Squall's arm towards the mattress, slackening his grasp.

"_Exactly_," he drawled with satisfaction. "Whether you'll actually say it or not, I _know_ you care about me, and I don't want to see the guy I have feelings for suffer any more than _you_ do. It hurts, you know, and it's pretty fuckin' scary. But maybe you still have to experience what it's like to watch someone you love be in pain to understand this."

"What do _you_ know, you self-righteous asshole!" Squall spat vehemently into the blond's unassuming face, yanking back his arm now with all the strength he possessed. His pretty features were contorted into a strange grimace, and he looked both pained and infuriated. "You don't know a damn thing about me! I _grew up_ watching my mom be in agony _every day_! I know more about it than you ever will! Fuck you!"

"And what do you think your mom would say if she _knew_ what you're doing to yourself, huh?" Seifer replied testily, furrowing his brows into a steep frown. "C'mon, tell me. Or you actually wanna find that out for yourself one day? Because it's going to happen, trust me on that."

Squall, who immediately mistook the grave undertone to Seifer's voice as a threat, slowly and deliberately pulled away from the blond until none of their body parts were touching. Seifer knew he was losing him – that he had said something he shouldn't have – when he fully took in the twisted blend of panic, resignation and betrayal on Squall's face. Still debating on what he should do to fix the situation, he watched how Squall crawled over to the edge of the mattress, where he sat motionless for a while, his elbows resting on his knees and his head bowed, facing the floor. Finally, Squall placed his feet on the ground, slid forward a little ways and let out a hollow laugh as he tugged on the hem of his shirtsleeve.

"I see," Squall said starkly, a bizarre edge to the words as his gaze flew around the room. His eyes looked cold and empty – vacated by any fringe of emotion, but shadowed by memories too dark to put into words.

Finally, the dark haired boy cut his gaze to Seifer's face, and the blond didn't like what he saw. Something had changed.

"... I know what this is all about."

"Oh, you _do_, huh?" Seifer replied, crossing his arms and letting out a whistle. He knew he was pushing it, but he, too, was feeling provoked and short-tempered. "Well, do tell."

Squall grimaced and hissed, balling his fists on top of his thighs when he narrowed his eyes and growled, "This is about sex, isn't it?"

"... _What_?"

The sardonic frown dropped flat from Seifer's face when he stared at the brunette, dumbstruck by what he had just been told. The younger teen returned his vacuous stare with an ominous glint in his otherwise expressionless eyes, and he let out a low, soft chuckle.

Seifer had never heard anything more disturbing.

"It's always about sex," Squall whispered, pressing his lips to a thin, quivering line that turned into a painful, morbid smile.

"What? _No_, dammit! What the fuck are you talking about? _What's_ about sex? How in the hell do you figure _any _of this is about _sex_?" Seifer retorted when he finally regained a grip on the conversation. None of Squall's words or his pattern of logic made any sense; how did the brunette possibly get the idea that Seifer was pressuring him into having sex? If this was about getting laid, he would've moved along to the next piece of ass a _long _time ago. The blond shook his head in disbelief, and he watched in alert how Squall pushed off the bed and stood up. Cautiously, Seifer cocked a brow.

"Hey, what are you doing?" he asked. "Squall!"

"Shut up," Squall murmured eerily. Then, with a few sharp, quick motions, he suddenly started to unbuckle his belt, giving yet another ghostly chuckle. "You know what...? It's fine. It doesn't bother me. I'll give you what you want. You win."

"What...? Wait, _what_ are you _doing_?" Seifer choked, raising his hands in flaring panic. "Squall!"

"I'll sleep with you," Squall declared defiantly, and his voice wavered, then broke as he swallowed and tears stung his eyes. Seifer could see them glass over and he noticed that red tell-tale tint creeping into the bright white of his eyeballs. Squall was breathing much faster now; he seemed to be losing control over his already unstable emotions, and this alone was enough to worry the shit out of Seifer.

"I don't care. I don't give a _fuck_, okay! This is _nothing_!" Squall barked hysterically, struggling through the raw hoarseness in his throat. Somewhere under the constant rush of his own blood, he could hear a low ringing sound that slowly pushed him into the realms of insanity. He didn't want to hear it; he didn't want to hear _anything_.

He was determined to make it stop.

"I'll do whatever the fuck it is that you want, if that's the only way you'll leave me the hell alone!" the dark haired teen continued to rant, and he clawed at his shirt with tears in his eyes. "I'm tired of this bullshit! I have _enough_ shit to worry about without you threatening to cut yourself or rat me out to my mother! I'll give you what you want, okay, just leave me the _fuck _alone after that! I'm sick of it! I'm so _fucking _sick of it!"

Seifer, whose poor head couldn't possibly keep up with the speed at which Squall's brain channels had flipped into apeshit mode, watched with wide eyes as the crying, yelling and hiccoughing brunette tried to undo his belt, kick off his boots and take off his shirt at the same time, going at a rate of a million miles an hour. Finally, Seifer's perplexed mind seemed to lodge into the urgency of the situation, and he immediately catapulted himself off the bed.

"What the _hell_ are you doing? Hold on a fuckin' minute!" Seifer yelped, staring at the shaky boy in front of him who was trying to unbutton his own pants. Letting out a stunned gasp, Seifer finally took more drastic measures by grabbing both of Squall's arms and steadying them in the air.

"Stop that!" he ordered firmly, finally reverting to pinning Squall's arms up against his sides when the boy threw a remarkable tantrum. "Fuck, just _calm_ down! Stop taking off your fucking clothes!"

"No! Fuck you! I'm putting an end to this shit!" Squall screamed through tears, fighting fiercely against Seifer's hold as panic washed over his face. "Let me the fuck go! Let go! Son of a bitch, let the _fuck_ _GO_!"

"Oh, for fuck's sake..."

Grunting, Seifer crowded the brunette against the wall behind him. He clutched his arms around Squall's torso, purposely ignoring the smaller boy's rampant physical endeavors at breaking free. The brunette continued to struggle and spit venom at the older teen, yelling and cussing and raging until Seifer's quiet, melancholic voice finally traveled to his ears and reached his shattered mind.

"Stop... Slow down... You're making yourself sick, Squall..."

Indeed, Squall's stomach was lurching as he hiccupped, trying to cry, scream and inhale at the same time, and his brain had become numb and dizzy with pain. The room was spiraling bizarrely around him, and he was almost relieved that he could barely see past Seifer's shoulders.

Everything was falling apart, and he had no desire to even stop it from happening.

He was so sick of it all.

"I hate you... I fucking hate you so much," the brunette sobbed, digging his head into the crook that connected Seifer's neck and shoulders.

"I know," Seifer whispered, understanding the true meaning behind Squall's words that was so far from hatred. "I know."

"Shit... _shit..._"

"It's alright," Seifer murmured. "Just relax. Everything's fine... I'm not here to make a play on you. You're safe here. You're with _me_. You're safe. I promise."

_Safe_.

_..:: "You're safe here. You're with me." ::.._

Safe from harm. Safe from _yourself_.

Safe from...

'_Him... he... he isn't... here... Seifer's not him... Seifer's not... He didn't... he's not like...'_

Squall dropped his head, eyes burning with hurt as he let out a groan. He couldn't believe what he had tried to do, and he was thunderstruck by the fact that Seifer hadn't taken advantage of the situation. He was simply standing there, holding him, patiently rubbing his back. Something in Seifer's carefully muttered words had quenched his blind rage, but even the blond's soothing presence couldn't fill the gaping void in Squall's heart. Nothing could, and none of his attempts at finding something – or _someone_ – to cure that deep, indescribable need of his soul had ever worked out right. He tried, he really did, but none of his efforts seemed to have any effects; he only ever made things worse, and the people he cared for always ended up leaving him behind. He was scared to feel, scared to love, scared to lose, scared to trust. He feared life itself, but he was bound to it by the need of his family, no matter how much he wanted to simply give up and surrender to a state of nothingness.

He just didn't know what to do anymore

"Just let yourself go," Seifer cooed amidst the scarlet haze in his mind. "Just one time – trust me and _let go_."

"Let go...?" Squall sniffled bitterly, grunting against Seifer's shoulder. "Why... what for... This j-just..."

"Because we all gotta let go at some point," Seifer explained patiently, trying to hold Squall and pet his lower back at the same time. He felt like he was trying to soothe a frightened animal, and perhaps the difference to his current situation was truly marginal.

"Ugh..."

"You can't keep everything holed up inside, you're gonna go crazy if you do," the eighteen year old continued, more wisdom to his words than seemed common to his age. "Life wasn't meant to be challenged by one person alone on their own. You can't handle _everything _by yourself."

The brunette remained stubborn. "Yeah, I can..."

Sighing, Seifer reached around until he felt the bones and muscles covered by a negligible layer of clothing that made up Squall's arm. He ran his palm down Squall's left elbow and forearm, then stopped to envelope the boy's bandaged wrist. He could feel Squall going rigid at the demonstrative touch, his muscles taut like wires and his breath stopped clear in his lungs.

"No," Seifer finally said solemnly, shaking his head against Squall's. "You can't."

Squall said nothing in return. Perhaps it was an acknowledgment of his own incapacity, neither of them really knew, but Seifer wasn't going to press a response. Low, harsh sounds came from the other boy's throat when he was breathing, but no words. At some point, Squall gave a futile tug on his arm, but his efforts were pitiful at best. Seifer only held him more tightly in return, and he figured that maybe this was exactly what Squall had wanted to achieve. The brunette didn't struggle further against the hold, anyhow, and Seifer felt the muscles of his fragile body going lax after a while. They still stood tilted against the wall, but Seifer ensured not to make the other boy feel too crowded; his arms were free to move as they pleased, although they just hung by Squall's sides, twitching reflexively every now and then. It was a calm, almost narcotic embrace, and the silence reverberating between them was broken only by the sound of their breathing.

"You know..." Seifer finally muttered after several minutes, but his voice trailed off when he concentrated on slowly rubbing the small of Squall's back with his thumb, finding a bare, smooth patch of skin between the brunette's waistband and sweatshirt. Touching was just so much better than talking; he knew how to express himself that way, how to get his point across. It was such a tiny, miniscule effigy of a touch, too, not sexual at all, but Seifer received more pleasure out of petting Squall so innocently than he had ever gotten out of the longest make-out sessions with the most crafty of his lovers.

Funny how life was just so twisted that way.

"What? Know... what?" Squall asked eventually, and quite despite himself, digging for the rest of Seifer's sentence that had gotten lost amidst the sensations. Perhaps he suddenly found words easier to endure than the feeling of Seifer's warm hands branding his skin.

Seifer thought that his false interest, which he identified as nothing more than another wall Squall was trying to erect to guard himself in his current vulnerable state, both very adorable and very infuriating.

Really, was there anything about Squall that wasn't a complete antithesis?

"I was just thinking," Seifer drawled, ignoring Squall's softly derisive chuckle. Little bastard had attitude even when his life had become a total nightmare.

"I was thinking that, when it comes down to it... I have much more to lose than you do."

He could almost hear Squall frowning. The brunette was shifting slightly, as if the movements would aid his thought process. Finally, Squall breathed, "What do you mean?"

Seifer thought that he could make out the mistrust and disagreement glowering beneath the smooth, but slightly scratchy surface of Squall's inflection. Smiling cryptically as he inhaled the scent of Squall's damp, tousled hair, the blond said, "I'm talking about you and me. I'm not nearly as dense as you think I am, you know. You think I'm just another cocky football jock tryin' to get into your pants. You think I'm gonna fuck you and walk away, because that's all I want from you – a quick lay. So what would it even matter to you if I was here or gone? I'm no one special. In fact, I'd venture to say I'm just a fuckin' nuisance to you."

The blond finished with a curt snort of laughter, and then he waited. He wasn't dumb; he knew what he had said wasn't entirely true. Despite Squall's attitude and the way things had progressed that evening, Seifer was well aware that the brunette harbored feelings for him that were very different from annoyance and spite. Squall cared for him, liked him, had a crush on him for all Seifer could tell, but there was a certain need within himself that he needed fulfilled, too – a need to hear and not _guess_ the nature of the other boy's sentiments.

It was an urge that was entirely alien to him.

After a minute of doing nothing but breathing and thinking and _existing_, Squall suddenly answered in a voice devoid of his usual crankiness and pride, "You don't know anything about what you are to me."

"I don't?" Seifer asked rhetorically, perking up.

Squall shook his head. "No."

"Do you wanna elaborate on that?"

"... No."

The blond let out a sigh that had already been building for several minutes. Honestly, he had figured as much.

"Man, that's just_ harsh_," he snorted, before his voice grew serious. "But have it your way. I wonder though... do you have any idea what _you_ mean to me?"

Another pause, more drawn out and uncomfortable this time. Seifer could feel Squall's breathing pattern changing, becoming more awkward as he exhaled sharply against his neck. The brunette was hesitating, considering his selection of answers very thoughtfully, before he finally admitted, "No... I don't."

"Really..." Seifer drawled. "I guess I need to tell you then, because you really oughta know."

Laughing quietly at Squall's stiff silence, he added, "It's not like I never told you before, either, but perhaps you need to hear it again."

Suddenly, he freed one arm from around Squall's body and gingerly reached back into his pant pocket.

"... Or, better yet," he declared after a pregnant pause, "Maybe I should _show_ you."

Squall's muscles tightened when Seifer took a step backwards. The brunette readied himself for something, although he didn't exactly know for what. He had picked up the subtle shift of nuances in Seifer's tone, but he wasn't sure if he had mapped the changes out correctly. Honestly, they just confused him.

After all, why would Seifer suddenly sound downright _nervous_?

He pushed away from the wall, simply because the feeling of being so close to it was far too similar to the earlier events of the night, and he stood semi-firmly before the blond, fidgeting with his hands because he didn't know what else to do with them. He looked up cautiously and glanced at Seifer's face, unsure of what he would find. He wondered at the bright, almost feverish gleam in the other boy's eyes. Was that _excitement_ suddenly sparking in those viridian green orbs that fixated him almost anxiously?

Why?

He didn't even understand when Seifer pulled his right hand, closed to a fist, out of the rear pocket of his jeans. Squall studied the movement, followed it with his eyes; it was slow and conscious, as if Seifer was giving him time to prepare. Nevertheless, Squall still flinched when Seifer took that loose fist and pressed it against the open palm of the brunette's left hand to unravel his clenched fingers very gingerly.

"What...?"

Squall felt a narrow, jagged piece of something hard and cool in his hand that had an oddly familiar shape to it. Seifer withdrew his fingers, which were slack once more, and he stared at Squall as if he wanted to burn the image of his face into his memory.

As if he never wanted to forget that very moment.

Lowering his thin, perfectly curved brows into a confused scowl, Squall cautiously looked from Seifer's face to his own hand.

He didn't understand what he found there.

Resting in his open palm was a key that looked just like any he owned, but newer and much less worn. He was certain he had never seen it before. Perplexed, the brunette lifted it to his eyes to examine it while he twirled it between his long fingers.

"What is this?" he asked, chancing a quick glimpse at the other boy out of the corner of his eyes. His tone was genuinely curious.

A smile played at the corners of Seifer's lips, and he reached out to turn Squall around and wrap his arms around him from behind. The brunette glared at the gesture, but he didn't struggle when Seifer leaned down and placed his chin on top of his right shoulder. His arms felt warm around his waist, his grip steady.

For some reason, the pain in Squall's head suddenly vanished.

Seifer studied the side of the boy's pretty face with interest; Squall's expression was closed, but confusion danced across the navy surface of his eyes.

He looked so goddamn adorable when he was lost.

"It's a key, silly," Seifer crooned eventually, letting out a gentle snort of laughter.

"I know that. Don't fuck with me," Squall replied testily, piercing the other teen with a sharp glare out of the corner of his eyes.

"I'm not, I'm not," Seifer quickly soothed him with a knockout grin, which did little to prove his innocent intentions. "It's a copy of my house key."

"Your...?" Squall started, and his eyes widened. To Seifer's amusement, he didn't even finish that sentence out loud and instead fell into a perplexed state of silence.

"Yeah," the blond nodded. "That's right."

"But... why are you giving it to _me_?"

For about a minute or so, Seifer wondered if the brunette could truly be that naïve. There was no understanding in the younger boy's eyes at all; he looked cute, irritated, and totally, entirely fucking _oblivious_.

Seifer was in awe.

"Uh, not to state the obvious, but... I'm giving it to you because I want you to have a key to my place," the blond explained evenly, suppressing a smirk that he just knew would ruin the mood.

"But _why_?" Squall continued to probe, frowning very sternly. "Why?"

"... Man, if I got a buck for every time you asked me that question, I'd be one filthy rich son of a bitch by now," Seifer laughed, throwing back his head, but not loosening his embrace on Squall for even a second. Finally, he sighed and his emerald eyes met with Squall's strikingly blue ones.

God, the brunette was so absurdly _beautiful_.

"I'm giving it to you because I _like_ you, Squall," Seifer murmured as if it was the most natural response in the world, and he regarded Squall with a true, honest smile that made even the cold brunette's knees go weak at the sight. "I really have a thing for you, alright, and... I want you to trust me. I know you've been hurt, but I want you to see that I'm different, and I'll do whatever it takes to prove it to you. I'm not trying to fuck you over, and I'm not keeping any secrets or hidden agendas from you. My place is your place, come by and do whatever you want, whenever you want. Hang out, sleep over, paint the place pink... I really don't care, as long as you're here."

He looked at Squall, watching his meticulously chosen words sink in with the startled brunette. He'd practiced this speech almost two dozen times over the past few hours, but in the end, his words had taken their own course and turned out entirely different than he had planned. Strangely enough, this unexpected development of the situation seemed to be working in his favor – Squall was gazing at him with eyes full of bewilderment, but he looked touched and flattered at the same time.

That adorably stunned stare of Squall's almost made Seifer forget the rest of his speech, and he had to pause for a moment to organize the words inside his mind before he continued.

"Look, I know what you're thinking and I don't blame you, but... even if you believe nothing of what I just said, at least take my word for _this_: I don't wanna see you hurting, and I don't wanna see you in danger. No matter what you do or think of me, don't ever sleep on that playground again like that one night I found you, you hear me?" he continued, possessively squeezing Squall's lean sides as if to get his point across more thoroughly. "If you need to crash somewhere, then do it here, with me, so that I can be there for you if shit hits the fan. And... if you ever feel like cutting up one of your body parts again, _call_ _me _– I _promise _I'll be there, and I'll do whatever the hell it takes to make your pain go away."

Seifer smiled, very passionately and yet full of calm, and he could tell that the boy in his arms was choking up. Squall was staring at the key in his hand, swallowing heavily. He opened his mouth, but couldn't dredge up the right words to say; wild thoughts were flooding through his head, and he could put them in no coherent order. For a long time, he debated the gift he had been given, and whether he should keep it. Was it appropriate? Was it _right_? Was he making any sort of commitment by accepting it? If so, did he _mind_...?

"Just hold on to it," Seifer finally offered, shooting Squall a small, but reassuring grin that was intended to ease the brunette's inner struggle that showed so visibly on his face. "Keep it. You don't owe me anything."

Squall swiped a vague glance at him out of the corner of his eyes. Seifer found that he still looked uncertain, but to the blond's surprise, Squall finally closed his hand around the key very tightly, lowered his head and whispered coarsely, "... Thanks."

Seifer stared, then held him tight, burying his face against the delicately curved slope of Squall's neck. He breathed heavily in and out, absorbing Squall's scent and the emotional weight of this very moment. He could hear the pots and pans churning in the distance, probably overflowing with burnt food, and he felt a very quiet Shiva streaking gingerly around their legs. Honestly, this evening hadn't progressed at all as he had planned, but such was life, and what mattered the most to him was the dark haired boy he was holding in his arms, as well as the fact that Squall had accepted his bravely offered gift of trust, honesty and commitment. Seifer had never given a house key or something similar to any of his former lovers, nor had he ever felt the urge to.

He had never given them his _heart_, either.

Looking back at his relationships, he realized that he had held so many girls' and guys' hearts in his hands, only to drop them carelessly and never waste a thought on regret or guilt. He had lied, cheated, and broken so many girls' fragile self-esteem that it had become something like a pastime to him. He had never given a damn about anyone's feelings – he'd had no reason to. Lovers had come and gone, and none of them had touched his life or his emotions. They were like dust in the wind – once there, then nothing but a stale memory. Perhaps he had never truly accepted them as human beings capable of hurting.

He should have known that his past would come to haunt him one day.

'_I guess I'm not... a good guy.'_

It kind of hurt to admit this to himself, but the notion also sparked his undying pride; despite his history, he _could be_ the perfect boyfriend – the perfect lover, the perfect friend. He wanted to be, he wanted to _do_ whatever necessary it took to please the complicated guy in his arms and wipe the sadness from his face. He wanted to see Squall laugh – he wanted to bring him happiness and worship every fucking aspect of his body and soul.

... Sex?

God, who was he kidding? Of course, Squall had a point; in a way, this _was_ about sex. It always had been. Hell, he figured he couldn't be blamed for wanting to fuck Squall just as much as the next red-blooded gay guy on the street. At the same time, however, the prospect of sex with the brunette was only a small fragment of Seifer's motivations, no longer the main catalyst as it maybe once had been. Squall was no piece of ass to him, and certainly no easy conquest. He wouldn't be satisfied by a meaningless fuck or two, and he felt no desire for either. Seifer wanted all of the brunette – head, heart, body, soul, _everything_ – and he was prepared to face any challenge thrown in his path.

He didn't know that Squall would redefine the term "challenge" for him in more ways than he could have imagined, even in his wildest of dreams.

* * *

_"Flying Dreams" Lullaby is from "The Secret of Nimh" movie. I do not own either. _You should look it up sometime, if you're curious. It's a beautiful song.

If any of you didn't read the Chapter 21 Extra, this chapter might have been a little confusing. I know I said I'd write this so that anyone who didn't read the extra would still be able to follow the plot, and I do believe I accomplished this. I never said I wouldn't confuse anyone, lol. Okay, maybe I'm just making excuses for being grumpy about ff(dot)net's "No NC-17 stuff" policy and simply being lazy. If needed, I'll be more than willing to make a PG-rated summary of Ch. 21 Extra. Then again, I'm getting the feeling we're all a bunch of pervs anyway and nobody was scared off by my warnings on the extra :)


	23. Two Words To Choke Upon

-:-**  
Chapter 23  
****Two Words To Choke Upon**

_"I'm glad we understand each other, you and I."_

-:-

_As you stood there_

_In the night air_

_With such beauty_

_That the stars stared_

_From their distance_

_You were different_

_Like a dream_

_That no one could refuse._

_"Dreams We Conceive" - Trans-Siberian Orchestra_

-:-

Infinite. Whole. Timeless.

It was a piece with no beginning and no end.

A circle, so perfect in its own unremarkable way, and a symbol of undying love and the continually renewed vows of a married couple.

Or so he had been told.

Tentatively, the small, dark haired boy touched the shiny, iridescent pair of rings that sat on a white satin pillow which he was balancing carefully on his knees. He was eleven years old; too young to fully understand the symbolism and pure excitement every adult in the room ceremoniously seemed to channel towards those cold, exquisitely crafted pieces of jewelry. He did, however, remember very well how his mother first showed him the smaller of the two rings on her left hand a few days ago, proudly twirling her wrist so that the diamond encrusted platinum band would catch the light.

Back then, the boy had found himself much more fascinated with his mother's incessant happiness than with the expensive piece of jewelry which she seemed so very fond of.

_'If it makes her happy, it's all right, I suppose,'_ the boy thought as he gently petted his mother's wedding band. The second ring that was perched on the small pillow wasn't nearly as elaborate and looked in fact quite plain; he eyed it skeptically, not sure what to make of it, or rather, of the meaning that it held.

_'Mr. and Mrs. Kearan... that's what they will be called from today on, I guess. I'm glad she said I could keep my last name for a while... I like it much better than Kato's. Well... ugh. When are they going to start, anyway? It sure is hot in here.'_

Scrunching up his nose, he used his right hand to scratch his throat and pull at the expensive silk tie that was laced carefully around his neck. The collar of his starched light blue shirt and black suit jacket was too tight; he felt like he was being choked by the stiff fabric. With a small frown, he stuck out his tongue in frustration and then resumed to aimlessly look around the room to observe the commotion around him.

He was sitting at the foot of the staircase in his stepfather's beach house at Esthar. The place was swarming with women in colorful, fancy dresses that had swathed themselves in expensive perfume, and there were many men in black tuxedos or differently colored suits. Most of them were people that Squall had never met before in his life and whose names he couldn't or didn't want to remember. They were men and women of all ages that would randomly ruffle his hair, tug on his clothes or even pinch his cheek. Some would talk to him on occasion, but he was feeling anxious and restless, uninterested in their questions about his school, his friends or the baby sister he was going to have before long.

'_That's right. A sister... Hm. I think I'll like having a sister. I think a little brother would be okay, too. Maybe Mom and Kato are going to have another baby. Yeah... I think that would be kind of cool.'_

"Squall! Hey, Squall. What are you doing down there, buddy?"

The brunette boy looked up, and his crystal blue eyes fell on the tall, handsome figure of his stepfather leaning in the door frame to the formal dining room. The dark haired man was grinning at him, and he laughed when he noticed how Squall's eyes widened as they examined his stepfather's crisp, marvelous black tuxedo.

Kato Kearan looked like a prince that had stepped out of a fairytale.

"Wow..." Squall said respectfully. "You look good."

"Why, thank you," Kato responded with another small chuckle, before lowering himself on one knee at the foot of the steps to place both of his hands on Squall's shoulder and swiftly fix the boy's disarranged tie. "You look very handsome yourself, Squall."

The young boy with the shaggy brown hair said nothing and instead studied the man in front of him intently. He genuinely liked Kato; the man was laid-back, funny, and just all around "cool." They had known each other for about a year now, and yet, sometimes, Squall still felt uneasy around the other male, without really being able to figure out the reason why. He had never mentioned this to his mother; frankly, he saw no reason to. She was happier with Kato than Squall had ever seen her before. It was a nice change to see her smile at someone other than himself. He had no plans of unnerving her with the silly, rare and probably completely unfounded discomfort that he felt in Kato's presence.

"Have you seen your mother yet?" Kato asked, still perched down before his stepson, who thoughtfully shook his head.

"No," the eleven year old boy with the stunningly handsome features answered, sounding a bit let down. "That lady with the really ugly hat said she was busy putting on her dress or something. Then she mumbled something bizarre about needing something blue and something borrowed, and she looked at me really weird... that's when I left."

"Haha! The lady with the ugly hat?" the man laughed. "Kiddo, there are many ladies with ugly hats here today. I'm assuming you're talking about my aunt Maxine, though. She's up there with your mother and the bridal party, throwing a real fuss."

"I guess so," Squall shrugged. "I don't know."

"Well, she'll probably be a little bit longer. You know how those women are, buddy. They take hours getting ready for a date, let alone a wedding. Hey... thanks for keeping an eye on our rings, by the way."

"Uhu."

Kato patted the boy's cheek when Squall nodded his head.

This time, the man didn't smile.

"I love your mother. You know that, right?" Kato said, and the pitch of his voice changed. Squall couldn't say why, but he suddenly started to feel uneasy. He didn't like the seriousness and urgency that had crept into the man's tone. He liked it better when Kato was joking with him. "And... I love you, too, Squall. I mean it."

"Yeah, I know," Squall muttered with the typical repulsion of a pre-teen faced with sentimentalism, and his gaze flitted around the room evasively, avoiding Kato's face.

Leaning forward, Kato placed a quick peck on his stepson's forehead, which Squall accredited with a sound of reluctance. "Well, then. I guess we had better get outside, bud. It's time to say 'I Do' here before long."

"Huh? 'I Do'?" Squall repeated, quirking his brows. He looked puzzled. Honestly, he had never witnessed a wedding before, hence most details of the ceremony were quite foreign to him.

"Yes," Kato said as he stood up and gently pulled the boy to his feet and guided him outside towards the beach front, where the lavish outdoor wedding service was about to unfold. "They're two words a man can easily choke upon, you know."

"Oh."

"Don't worry. You and your mom are the best thing that's ever happened to me. I'll take care of you... both of you, as well as your new sister, once she's born."

"Yeah, I know," Squall answered, his attention drifting. "Uh, can I play with Griever for a little bit? I think he'll be lonely locked up in the pool house for very long."

The man frowned at him for a moment, before seemingly catching himself and answering softly, "I think it'd be better if you stay here with me, Squall. The wedding is about to start. I don't want you getting dog hair all over your suit. You're the ring bearer, remember?"

"Oh," Squall murmured, looking disappointed. "Right."

"You can go see him later, kiddo."

"... I know."

"Are you mad, Squall?" the man asked calmly, studying the brunette.

"No," the young boy answered, looking almost startled as he paced across the back porch and crossed into the sand, still carrying the pillow with his parents' wedding rings. "I understand."

"Good. I'm glad we understand each other, you and I."

"Yeah..." Squall answered, eager to please the man that would soon officially become his father and fill a seat in the boy's life that had always been empty. "Me, too."

And as he walked towards the orange crest of the sun that had begun its' slow descend on the glittering ocean waters, a perfectly young and perfectly naïve Squall Leonhart had no idea that he was understanding nothing at all.

* * *

She was tiny, warm, pink... just a flash of erratic movement between a bundle of soft, woolen blankets in his exhausted mother's arms. Gingerly, the small brunette boy sitting on the edge of the hospital bed poked the baby's arm, surprised by her newness and the perfection of the little fingers of her left hand that suddenly closed around his thumb.

"Hey," Squall protested, trying to retract his hand, but the baby's grasp was surprisingly strong.

Their mother laughed softly.

"She's already wrapped around your finger, Squall," she crooned, kissing the top of her daughter's head and her son's cheek. "Isn't she beautiful?"

Frowning, the twelve year old watched her squeezing his single digit while kicking her little legs in her blanket. She looked a bit hairless and just a tiny bit deformed to his eyes, but after some careful consideration, he had to admit that he got it... this was a brand new human being, and despite her size, she looked completely developed – from her fingernails to her eyebrows to every single toe.

It was kind of a miracle.

"I guess so..." Squall answered with a small grunt, now playing with her chubby legs. "Hey, she sure looks like she's been eating pretty good in your belly."

"Haha," Raine giggled, amused by his cynical, yet childish sense of humor. "Yes, she is well-nourished, and that is a good thing."

"Yeah... that's true," her son agreed, a mischievous smile now playing on his lips as he looked at his mother. "I kinda get now why you always wanted me to bake cookies with you and eat all those nasty pickles... she was kinda worth it."

"You think so, sweetie?" Raine asked, beaming at him.

"Uhu."

"That makes me glad."

"So are all babies made from pickles and chocolate chip cookies?" Squall asked with a grin.

"Haha," his mother laughed, shaking her head. "No, just this one. You, sweetheart, were made from strawberries and Tabasco sauce."

"What? Really?"

"Yes. I have never craved so many strawberries in my life, and when I was pregnant with you, I had to put Tabasco sauce on pretty much everything. I think I even had strawberries with Tabasco sauce once..."

"Hah." Squall snorted, not sure whether he believed her or not. Personally, he wasn't much of a fan of strawberries, nor of Tabasco sauce.

He was still playing with his baby sister's leg, when his face suddenly lit up. "Hey, so what are you gonna name her?"

Rocking the beautiful dark eyed girl back and forth, Raine answered in a voice that was gentle and bursting with pride, "Ellone. Ellone Rydia Aeris Kearan. After her grandmothers."

"Ellone, huh..." the twelve year old repeated, pondering the name. The whole thing sounded kind of long and complicated to his ears. "Can I call her Ell?"

"Of course, sweetie. I'm sure she'd like that."

"Where is Kato at, anyway?" the boy suddenly asked, looking at the clock in his mother's hospital room. Squall's stepfather had left the room nearly forty minutes ago to buy a few drinks and snacks at the hospital cafeteria. "He should've been back by now."

"Well, it's probably busy down there," Raine mused.

"Or he got lost," Squall chuckled, then slid off the bed and placed his hands on his hips. "I'll look for him."

His mother went to shake her head, protesting. "No, darling, stay here, I don't want you getting lost out there. This is a big hospital."

"Mom," the boy, who had already retreated to the door, chided gently across his shoulder, "Have I ever gotten lost anywhere?"

"Well... no, I suppose not," she responded gingerly, heaving a sigh. Truly, even working her memory, she could not recall Squall ever drifting too far from her side, nor him getting lost when he did choose to wander on his own. "But, I'd really feel better if you—"

"Don't worry, okay?" he lilted, smiling now as he slanted his head to the side, looking so much like his father. "I'll be right back."

And with that, he disappeared out of her room, leaving behind an air of fearlessness and wisdom much too foreign for his years.

* * *

_"Stryker 2... airlift... Mount Gizeh facility... year old male... unconscious and breathing... severely hypothermic... core temperature of 87 degrees... IV's established... actively re-warming... vital signs of... heart rate... currently stable... helo pad... ETA fifteen-"_

There was darkness. Darkness, and noise... someone screaming, and a male voice, close to his ears, rambling words that were clouded to his mind. Strange hands, all over his body.

And he was cold. So very, very cold.

_'M-mom...'_

He wanted to call out for his mother, but his mouth seemed locked, shut by some mechanism he did not understand. He couldn't see, nor move. It felt like a dream... one he wanted to wake up from before it drove him insane.

_'Where... am...'_

"... Fifteen minutes. Has someone notified their parents that we found them?"

"Affirmative. Parents are on the way to the hospital. Stryker 1 will touchdown with the girl in approximately 5."

"Copy. Do you require anything further?"

"Negative. ED team 2 will meet you at the helo pad and take your patient to the trauma zone on arrival. How do you copy, Stryker 2?"

"Copy good. Direct on helo pad and ED team 2."

"Trabia Memorial Med Com out."

"Copy. Stryker 2 out."

_'What... what is...'_

The voices of two men seemed to be in his head, holding a conversation, accompanied by a static crackle. Squall tried to turn, but he couldn't use his arms or legs, nor could he move his head. There was pain everywhere, and his body felt so cold and numb. He didn't know where he was, nor what had happened.

There was movement everywhere around him. He was scared, and shivers lanced through his body as he cried out for the only person whose name would come to him at that time.

"M... M-Mom..."

"Hey, he's waking up! He's talking! Kid, can you hear me?"

"Ugh..."

Someone was touching his chest, right in the center, rubbing and pressing down upon the skin and the hard sternum beneath. Squall stirred.

"Ow..."

"C'mon kiddo, talk to me! Tell me your name!"

He opened his eyes, gingerly, as his conscience felt for the world around him. His vision was blurry and unsteady. There were shadows moving above him, and by his side. He couldn't make out their faces. Groaning, he tried to lift up his arm to rub at his eyes, but he couldn't move his limb by even an inch.

It felt like he was strapped down to something hard and unyielding, and his head seemed to be trapped in a helmet, or something of that sort.

"What's your name, son? Can you tell me your name?"

"Sq... Squall..."

"That's it, good boy. How old are you, Squall?"

Squall strained his memory, trying to ignore the random pictures flashing before his eyes. He found it difficult to concentrate. The most basic pieces of information seemed to swim out of his reach, mocking his every attempt at grasping them.

"I... I don't... know... I..."

"It's okay, sweetie, don't worry, you're alright. You're doing great."

"No... w-wait... I... I'm... fourteen," he answered, sounding almost startled as pieces of the disarranged puzzle that were his mind abruptly fell into place.

"Good job, Squall, very good. That's right, you're fourteen. You're doing great, Squall. Just hang in there. Everything will be okay. We'll take good care of you. I'm a critical care paramedic with Trabia Air Rescue, my name is John. You're in a helicopter right now, Squall. You're being airlifted to Trabia Memorial Hospital. Don't be scared... we're almost there."

_'A... helicopter...? But why... What's going-'_

And suddenly, every thought and every motion seemed to freeze inside Squall's body. His pain turned into numbness and shock as a long, hard gasp of terror escaped his cold, clammy lips that had been tinged blue by hypothermia.

"Where is my sister?"

* * *

"Squall."

_'Never... I never wanted... this is all...'_

"Squall."

_'If she dies... oh my god... she can't die, please, she can't, she... Please, I'll do anything, just... please don't die, Ell... Please...'_

"Squall?"

_'Why her... Why couldn't I be the one in the hospital, why her, why... Why did I have to get us lost in the snowstorm, why-'_

"Squall!"

The brunette boy jerked when he felt someone's hand on his shoulder and a voice somewhere close by his left ear. Staring up out of bloodshot, bruised eyes, he found his stepfather hovering above him. Squall was cowering at the edge of his bed in the skiing lodge at Trabia that Kato had rented for the week. He was wrapped in three thermal blankets, and still he was shaking. His skin had the color and temperature of snow.

"Squall," the man repeated his name for the fifth time. His facial expression was neutral as he studied his stepson from his elevated position. Squall was trembling under his touch, despite the warm clothes and covers he was wearing. He had been released from the hospital less than an hour ago.

"I..." the brunette started, but his hollow voice got lost somewhere among the hurt and the guilt that flooded his mind like a steady stream.

"You should go to bed," Kato suggested, his voice calm.

"I... I can't..."

"You need sleep."

"Can't I go back to the hospital?" Squall asked, looking up at the man pleadingly, whose eyebrows creased into a frown. "Please. I wanna be with them. I..."

"It would do no good."

"But—"

"Your mother is there," the boy's stepfather interrupted. "She will take care of Ellone. She needs to focus on your sister now. You would only be a distraction."

The young boy swallowed. Something was stabbing at his heart, and his eyes were burning brightly with guilt when he nodded and declined his head. "Yeah... y-you're right. I'm sorry... I..."

"Get some sleep. You're worn out, and you look like you're still cold. Do you want to take a hot bath?"

"No. I'm fine..."

Kato Kearan seemed unwilling to argue with his stepson. Instead, he quietly sank onto the mattress, right next to the youth whom he knew was fearing for the life of his only sister. Kato, too, was worried. Qualms of whether he should have given the snowmobile to Squall for Christmas, or whether he should have let his two children venture out on their own into the snowstorm ridden mountains of Trabia were zig zagging through his mind.

But he knew that words of sorrow or "what ifs" would do little good now that the damage had already been done. They would have to make the best of their situation, and pray that Ellone, who was still fighting for her young life in the hospital pediatric ICU, would pull through.

"I'll sleep with you tonight," Kato announced calmly as he wrapped one arm around his son's shoulder. "Your mom will be gone for a few days at least. I think we'll both be lonely for a while."

Squall remained silent as he stared through the window at the snowflakes falling so peacefully in the darkness, clinging to the frosted glass panels. He didn't even feel his stepfather nuzzling closer, placing a soft kiss upon his left temple.

He was only fourteen, but tonight, he had shed his childish innocence and been burdened with the cold, bone-chilling fear of losing a person he loved more than his own life.

He would do anything in his power to bring joy back into his family, to wipe the tears from his mother's eyes and bring life to the motionless form of his young sister.

Anything whatsoever.

_'This is all my fault.'_

And as he fell back into the covers, crying like a child into the sleeve of his sweater, he didn't know that his family would never be the same hereafter. He didn't know that his guilt would soon consume his own will to live, and that the man who was supposed to cherish him like a son would come to desire him like a lover, destroying his innocence once and for all. And he would endure the torture and the blame for years to come - he'd accept them as his punishment, knowing nothing of the tragic fact that none of this had ever been his fault.

As the snow fell silently on that dark, cold winter night, Squall was faced with his demons for the very first time. He was blindsided by their horrid touch that crawled over his once pure, naked skin, and he screamed as they forced their way into his heart, his mind and his body, violating him in a way that he had never been violated before.

He didn't know what had gone wrong, or if it had all been wrong to begin with, but he would never forget the day that his once happy, carefree life had been turned into a cruel nightmare.


	24. Own Worst Enemy

-:-**  
Chapter 24  
****Own Worst Enemy**

"_You don't even know what pain feels like."_

-:-

Tonight the sunset means so much  
The one thing that you know you'll never touch  
Like the feeling, the real thing  
I reach out for that sweet dream

But somehow the darkness wakes me up  
I've felt this emptiness before  
But all the times that I've been broken  
I still run right back for more.

_"Learn My Lesson" - Daughtry_

-:-

He paused at the front steps, looking up at the heavy bronze door knob resting against rain-slicked cherry wood that was set with colorful glass mosaics. As he stood still, his keys clutched tightly in one hand, a darkness passed over his face that hadn't been there before. For a brief, but intense moment, he considered turning around, simply walking away, and never coming back to this place he was supposed to call 'home' ever again.

'_Why... Why do I do this? I __**always **__come back. Every single damn day. I'm making it way too easy for him. When did I ever become so... pathetic?'_

The moment came and went, and he was still standing there, feeling the light fall of rain against his bare neck, like a reminder of his own weakness and humanity.

'_... I don't even have a choice. Not anymore. If I say anything now, it'll cause more damage than it's worth. Not that I even know what to say. No... I'll just wait it out. What's another month, or another year? It's all the same at this point. Soon, I'll never have to come back here again.'_

Squall breathed a sound of resignation as he adjusted his grasp on his motorcycle helmet, which he held clutched against his body with his left arm. Distractedly, he pulled his cell phone out of the pocket of his leather jacket to glance at the time. When the black, electronic digits on the illuminated display read "11:45pm", the deep crease between his eyes became more pronounced.

'_Too early for him to be in bed. Too late for me to not get in trouble. Great odds. Maybe I should've stayed over at Seifer's house after all. At least I wouldn't have to deal with this situation now.'_

Grimacing, Squall slipped his phone back into his pocket. He hated the thought of having to face his stepfather and – possibly – his mother at this time of the night, after he had been out for hours without notice. Someone had tried to call his phone twice from their home's landline over the past hour, although without ever leaving a voicemail message.

Somebody was bound to be up, perhaps pacing circles, waiting for his return.

'_He's gonna be pissed. They're __**both**__ gonna be pissed. I don't usually stay out this late without giving Mom some kind of excuse first. Fuck. I'm totally __**fucked**__.'_

The option of turning tail and heading back to Seifer's apartment became more and more enticing with each second that passed and each shrapnel of fright that seemed to drill itself deeper into Squall's heart. Really, why _shouldn't _he turn back? After all, the blond had nearly _begged _him to stay the night at his place. When his pleas hadn't swayed the brunette, Seifer had offered Squall a ride home so many times that the dark haired boy had wanted to punch him comatose, only to shut him the fuck up.

'_He was concerned... I get it. I'm not stupid. That's not the problem. I just don't... Fuck. Why do things have to be so complicated?'_

He let out a long sigh of frustration, before his face suddenly set and he took a resolute step towards the front door of his parents' house, pushing away the shadows that clouded his head and his judgment.

'_Fuck this.'_

Almost hastily, as if he was afraid that he would change his mind, he proceeded to unlock the door and hurried inside. The foyer was dark, but through the hallway straight ahead of him he could see that there was still a light on in the living-room. He was wet and dripping mud puddles onto the floor, but instead of removing his boots and his jacket, he swiftly strode towards the staircase. He would deal with his mother and stepfather in a minute; right now, he needed to collect his thoughts and his bravado around him, and he knew exactly where to find the peace and well of strength that he was looking for.

'_Ell's room...'_

He had developed a habit of sitting in his sister's room late at night, curled up in an armchair right beside her bed, only to watch her sleeping. Whenever the silence in his own bedroom got too loud, and his fears seemed to close in like walls around him, watching his little sister and knowing how vulnerable she was – how much she truly needed him and his protection – always gave him the energy to go on when he thought that he had no strength left in him to even take another breath.

'_As long as she needs me, I'm not going anywhere. I'd never give up on her. I don't care what he does to me. I'll always be there for her and protect her, no matter what. This is my responsibility.'_

"Where do you think you're going?"

Just as he had set one foot on the bottom step of the stairs, he could hear a noise somewhere close behind him, and a cold voice that suddenly cut through the silence and caused him to flinch. He froze, and his chest tightened as he turned and found the figure of his stepfather silhouetted against the dim light cast from the living-room. The man's eyes were dark and intense, threatening like the barrel of a loaded gun, and there was nothing kind or uncertain about the expression on his shadowed face.

Squall swallowed.

"Upstairs," he answered flatly, holding his stepfather's glare without confrontation.

He didn't know what else to say.

"Where were you?" Kato inquired, his tone calm, and yet intimidating enough to cause his stepson to shiver.

"... Nowhere."

The boy's response was predictably non-committal, and although Kato usually enjoyed the kid's unrefined attempts at defiance, right now, Squall was doing nothing but piss him off.

"Nowhere, huh?" the man repeated, a strange edge to his voice that Squall didn't like as his stepfather continued to stare him down. "You were gone all evening. That's an awful lot of time to be spending 'nowhere', Squall."

"I was riding my bike," Squall said without hesitating, omitting the fact that he had spent most of the night in Seifer's presence. "Ever since when do you have a problem with that?"

"Watch your smart little _fucking_ mouth, boy," his stepfather hissed, causing the boy to cringe at the uncalled-for backlash. "I've about had it with your attitude!"

"I was telling you the truth," Squall answered in a gritty, yet hollow tone of voice. "If you don't want to hear the truth, then don't _ask_."

"I think you need to learn your place, Squall," Kato snapped, the words a thinly masked threat, and yet his body language was not so ambiguous at all as he cracked the knuckles of his right hand.

"Maybe _you_ need to learn _yours_!" Squall shot back stubbornly, not caring whether he pissed his stepfather off further. His pent up frustration was getting the best of him; he was so tired of this, so tired of their sick little game of master and puppet. His arms were trembling at his side, and his hand clawed around his helmet, his grasp so tight that his knuckles were burning. Something was ringing in his ears.

He knew that no matter what he'd say, it'd always be the wrong thing, anyway. At least tonight, he was too exhausted to continue this pointless struggle any longer. If Kato wanted to hurt him, he would, regardless of what brilliant excuse Squall would come up with.

The man had never needed a special occasion to fuck him up.

Kato only chuckled in sinister amusement over Squall's display of obstinacy, but there was no humor in his eyes.

"Well, will you look at that. You've got some fight left in you, after all," the man said with an icy, fascinated drawl to his voice, studying the boy's tight features and the wariness in his posture. "Look at yourself - all dark and handsome in your little biker outfit, just a mouthful of attitude with nothing but a bunch of bullshit to back it up. Honestly, Squall, don't make me laugh. You're just a dumb little punk. At this rate, you'll never amount to anything but being a cum dumpster. What are you trying to do here, anyway? Take after your loser of a father?"

Squall raised his head, sudden anger and hatred burning in his eyes, mingled with grief over a perfect family he had always wanted, but never had.

"Better _him_ than _you_!" he spat without thinking, infuriated because Kato had finally struck a nerve.

When Kato took two steps towards him, Squall recoiled. He saw the wrath in the man's face – the impatience and unkindness – and he immediately regretted ever opening his mouth in Kato's presence.

"_Don't_!" the boy started, edging back, fear flashing in his translucent blue eyes as the soles of his boots scraped across the bottom of the stair steps. His heart sank into the pit of his stomach.

He couldn't take any more of this. Not tonight. Not like this.

"You—"

"Kato, what are you doing?"

With a surprised hiss, Squall closed his eyes as the chandelier in the foyer suddenly lit up, drenching the room in a bright white light. His mother appeared from the living-room, looking taken aback. She looked as if she had been sleeping. Squall, however, did not linger to face her; instead, he swung around and ran up the stairs, hearing his own heartbeat thudding in his ears with each step that he took, away from the man he hated so much that he wanted nothing more for him than to die.

"What was _that _all about?" Raine asked her husband, gesturing at the retreating form of her son with a frown. "Kato, what did you say to him?"

"Nothing," the man lied, swiping her a glance of surprise. "Why would you think that?"

"He looked about ready to start crying. I'm not blind, Kato," she said sternly, shaking her head. "What happened?"

"I only asked him where he was. It's late. I have a right to _ask_, Raine."

"He doesn't have a curfew," Raine reminded him, although she had to admit that it was unusual for her boy to stay out this late.

"Maybe we should rectify that," Kato suggested, crossing his arms in front of his chest authoritatively.

"He is a responsible teenager. I trust him. This is _my_ decision, Kato."

"I think you're giving him too much freedom, love," her husband insisted, trying to keep his voice calm, but there was irritation grating beneath the surface. "No matter what you think, the words 'responsible' and 'teenager' don't go together. Squall's been acting up quite a bit lately, if you ask me."

Raine eyed him carefully. "What do you mean by that?"

"You know what I mean," he answered coyly. "He comes home late, he doesn't tell us where he goes or who he spends his time with. He's hardly ever at home. He doesn't talk to us anymore."

"He made a new friend," Raine explained, tossing her hair back over her shoulder. "I'm happy he's getting out and spending time away from home, work and school. The poor kid works so much, I don't know how he's keeping up his grades. He really needed some distraction. Don't ruin this for him, please."

Kato stared at her, something in his mind slowly clicking into place. A 'new friend', huh? Right, he remembered now. That Seifer Almasy boy – the football player. The one that couldn't mind his own business. All in all, Kato wasn't sure what was going on between the boy and Squall, but whatever it was, he didn't like it one bit. Things were starting to get out of hand.

He wouldn't allow this to happen. He'd been in perfect control of Squall all these years, and that _wasn't_ going to change.

Kato was good at controlling people and situations. He always had been. The act in itself gave him a carnal pleasure that no one else would ever understand.

With a calculated smile, he looked at her. "... Remember what you asked me once? When you and I got married?"

"What?" she asked, cocking her head. She looked so much like Squall that way; so beautiful, so delicate, and yet so unquestionably proud and strong.

This subtle, unyielding strength of hers, the kind that required no acts of intimidation or cockiness at all, was one of the reasons he had fallen in love with her in the first place.

"You asked me to be a father to your son," he explained to her, his voice now soft, but determined. "I can't be a father to him unless you allow me to be. You can't shelter him all the time and justify his behavior. He will never listen to a word I say until he respects and accepts me as an authority figure."

"He does respect you, love," she soothed, stepping up to him to place one hand against his jaw, feeling the subtle hint of beard stubble beneath her finger tips as she stared into his dark grey eyes. "Squall is not a bad kid. He's a _teenager_ – he's seventeen years old. It's a difficult age. He's trying to find his place in life. Please, understand that."

"I do," Kato insisted. "I was seventeen once, too. But Squall is different. I just want to understand what's going on inside his head."

"But maybe that's none of our business," Raine suggested, and he blinked at her, truly perplexed for the first time. "I know he'd never do anything irresponsible. He's not the kind of kid that goes out and gets into trouble. As long as he's happy, I don't want to nag him about the reasons why. I know if there's anything he feels he wants to talk about, he'll come to us."

Kato stared at her, smiling inwardly at her naïve impression of her son. He knew that Squall cut himself on a regular basis, and yet his mother had no clue. She loved the kid to a fault, but truly, she was blind to the boy's problems, and Kato had every intention of keeping it that way.

"... If you say so, darling. You know him best, after all."

* * *

"Squall."

He was in his room, placing his treasured necklace and Seifer's house key in his nightstand drawer, when the voice of his mother caused him to jump. Raine saw him flinching, and facing her almost too hastily. With a gleam of worry in her eyes, she smiled at her son. Squall was already wearing pajama pants and a much too large, long-sleeved t-shirt. The outline of his body was stark against the only source of light in the room – the small silver reading lamp on his nightstand. It was well after midnight. She had tried not to listen to Kato's words, his seemingly unfounded suspicions, but after her husband had gone to bed, something had kept her awake.

"Can I come in?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah," he answered, looking at her in bewilderment. "Of course."

She walked up to his perfectly made bed and sank down upon the foot of the mattress, on the opposite side of Squall, wrapping herself tightly in her warm, light blue robe. Thoughtfully, she traced the creases of the perfectly folded sheets beneath her with her finger tips. Honestly, she had never understood when or why Squall had developed such a neat streak. He had always been a carefree, somewhat messy kind of kid, but by the time he had hit puberty, everything he touched had suddenly become immaculate.

It had never quite made sense to her.

"When do you have to go into work tomorrow?" she finally asked, if only to break the silence. He was still standing between the bed and the wall, looking almost uneasy as he was swiping sideway glances out the window. He had always been easily distracted as a child; obviously, _that_ hadn't changed.

"My shift starts at eleven," he answered mechanically. "I work until five."

"Oh, okay. Well... maybe I'll bring Ell by for lunch..." she mused, playing with her long, dark brown strands of hair.

Squall was eyeing her with a guarded expression.

"Okay," he answered disjointedly.

He wasn't sure where his mother was going with this.

"Squall," she suddenly started, staring at her handsome son almost pleadingly as she dropped her hands into her lap. "Sit down with me, please?"

He gazed at her for a moment, no thought or emotion visible on his face. She couldn't possibly tell what he was thinking. Finally, he nodded.

"... Alright."

Slowly, he sat down on the bed, leaning with his back against the headboard. Squall didn't like the concerned, almost somber look in his mother's eyes; it worried him. Every now and then, they would have these mother-son-talks, but lately, he had tried to keep them to a minimum.

He hated lying to her.

"Is everything okay?" she finally asked, gazing upon him carefully from across the bed. She noticed the small crease between his eyes when he cocked his head, returning her gaze.

"Of course," he said, sounding taken aback. "Everything's fine. Why are you asking me that?"

"I was just wondering..." she murmured, trailing off. She smiled, a bit helplessly. "You know... Kato has been worried about you."

Something in Squall's face hardened at the mentioning of the man's name, but the boy quickly cracked a small smile to hide his disgust. "Oh, really? What's he worried about?"

"He mentioned something about you staying out late... and not knowing where you spend your time. I told him that I trust you, and I do," she explained, holding Squall's gaze. "Still, sometimes I wonder if there is something you're not telling me."

He swallowed, but managed to keep the faked smile on his lips from fading.

"I'm not hiding anything from you," he lied.

"Would you tell me if something was wrong? If there was anything that's bothering you?"

"Yes," he affirmed without skipping a beat, willingly telling her everything that she wanted to hear... everything that was so far from the truth. "I would."

"That's good," she sighed, and he could tell that she was relieved. While he looked at her, his chest started to feel tight, and a surge of guilt passed through his heart.

'_Shit... I fucking hate this.'_

How much longer would he have to keep this up? Every time he lied, he felt as if he was made an accomplice to Kato's crimes. In some sick, twisted way, he was actually _helping _that man ruin him. Kato was fucking up his life, and instead of stopping him, he was covering for all of the man's atrocities. The irony of it all made Squall sick to his stomach.

But what options did he have?

It was either lying to his mother, or breaking her heart.

His choice was simple. He didn't even have to think about it.

"Well..." Raine started, beaming at him now, as if a huge load had fallen off her shoulders. Sometimes Squall wondered if she wasn't too effortlessly reassured. Then again, her lack of suspicion made everything so much easier for him. "By the way, how are things with you and Seifer, honey?"

He hadn't foreseen that change in topic, and it threw him off slightly, but he caught himself almost immediately. Shrugging, he looked away from her and answered in a non-committal tone, "Fine."

Honestly, why did she have to ask about him and Seifer as if the two of them were a couple of some sort?

"That's great," his mother said happily. "He seems like a very nice guy. Are you two getting along pretty well, then?"

"I guess so," Squall grunted, shrugging once more. For some odd reason, his cheeks were starting to feel a bit flush. The boy frowned as he glared at the bed sheets; the last thing he needed right now was to get flustered over Seifer in front of his mother.

The brunette woman giggled knowingly. There was something going on here, and Squall was quite terrible at hiding it. Her son really seemed to care about his new friend, although he would've probably never admitted it to her.

"You two have been spending quite a bit of time together," she noted, not seeing the sudden anxiety in Squall's expression. "I'm really happy you guys are friends, you know? Don't you want to bring him over again some time? We could all go to the beach at Fisherman's Horizon one weekend and stay at the cottage. There is plenty of room for all of us. Wouldn't that be fun, Squall?"

The look on his face was one of horror, rather than excitement, and as Squall cleared his throat, attempting to dodge the question, he suddenly remembered the school ball that he had agreed to attend with Seifer in less than a week. His mother must have noticed the sudden blank look in his eyes, because she tilted her head and asked, "What's wrong, honey?"

"Uh... Nothing... I just..."

He was stuttering, scrambling for words. He didn't usually get this way, all tongue-tied and clumsy. Again, he cleared his throat, and it took him a moment to wrestle up enough courage to meet his curious mother's gaze.

'_Fuck. I guess I might as well tell her.'_

"Speaking of Seifer..." Squall started, his voice strained. In a nervous gesture, he pulled on his shirt sleeves and muttered, "Uh... He kind of... Well... Uh... He suggested we go to that... uh... erh... that Homecoming thing... erh, Dance... uh, together."

"What? _Really_?" Raine exclaimed in surprise, sounding just like an overexcited teenage girl, and her face lit up. "Oh, how nice! What a wonderful idea!"

He raised an eyebrow in response.

"You think?" he asked, staring at her as if he questioned her sanity.

"Of course! I'd been hoping you'd go to some of the dances this year, since you didn't go to any of them during your Junior year. I think it's a great idea! You should definitely go with him. Squall, I hope you said yes?"

"... Well... uh... kind of, I guess."

"'Kind of'?" she questioned, raising her brows. "What do you mean, _kind of_?"

Squall looked more squeamish by the second. His cheeks were glowing. She wondered if he knew just how adorable he looked.

"Uh, well, I suppose I said yes," the boy huffed, darting small, nervous glances around the room. Finally, he gave her a look of sheer, almost childish incredulity. "You really think I should go?"

"But of course I do, silly! I think it's a wonderful idea!"

She laughed at the fact that Squall honestly seemed baffled by her positive response. It made no sense to her. What could she possibly have against her son and his best friend going to a school dance together? She was elated by the mere thought of it. She was certain that Seifer would show Squall a good time. The blond seemed very friendly, lighthearted and outgoing, without raising any concerns with her that he might try to get Squall into trouble.

Seifer was exactly what her reclusive son had needed, because honestly, a few weeks ago, she had been worried that Squall was turning into a bit too much of a hermit.

"So, when is it?" she asked, still beaming.

"When is what?" Squall replied vacantly.

"The dance, of course!" she said, rolling her eyes playfully.

"Oh... Uh, it's next Friday night, I guess."

"You _guess_?" she scolded him. "You know, you've got a whole lot of guessing going on here, Squall. You had better be sure about this and not stand up your date, darling! That would be terrible."

"Mom..." he said, cringing. "It's not like that. It's not a date."

"I know, I know," she laughed, winking at him. "Still, it's too bad, isn't it?"

"W-what? What do you mean?" he stuttered, taken aback. He was flustered, and truthfully, he was also starting to get irritated. What was she trying to say? What was this thing between him and Seifer, anyway, some kind of teenage girl fantasy for everyone to fuss over? He had foreseen Selphie's excitement concerning his and Seifer's date, because it had been all too predictable. But why in all hell did his _mother_ look so pleased about it?

Honestly, he had almost expected her to be a bit weirded out by the idea of her son going to a school dance with another guy.

Was he really the only one who thought the whole concept was entirely bizarre?

"What in the hell are you talking about?" Squall finally asked, glaring at her. "What's too bad?"

"Nothing, sweetheart," she assured him, gently shaking her head. "Don't be mad. I'm sorry for teasing you."

He crossed his arms in front of his chest defensively, but his facial expression became slightly more relaxed at her change in demeanor. She watched him, smiling, then asked, "What are you going to wear?"

Apparently, that thought hadn't even occurred to her son, because there was a certain air of perplexity to his tone when he answered, "Uh... I don't know."

"How about we go shopping together next week and find you a new outfit?" she suggested helpfully.

He shifted visibly, looking uncomfortable once more. "That's not necessary."

"Oh, come on, sweetheart. Let me buy you something nice to wear to the dance," his mother insisted. "The last time I saw you wearing dress clothes was to your sister's baptism."

"It's really not a big deal," Squall grunted. "It's just a school dance. I'll wear whatever."

"I'm sure Seifer will be dressing up," she tried suggestively.

Squall frowned and snorted cynically, "I doubt that."

"Oh, he seems like the type," Raine smiled. "Take my word for it. So let's go and get you a sharp outfit, too, okay?"

"Whatever."

"Please?" she begged. "It would really mean a lot to me."

Sighing, he rubbed his right palm over his brow bones. Honestly, did she have to get all involved in this matter? It was just a stupid dance. He didn't even really want to go, and the last thing he wanted to do was make a big deal out of the whole occasion. He had only agreed to go for Seifer's sake, and he was pretty sure that the blond would show up in jeans and a goddamn t-shirt. Frustrated, he chewed on his bottom lip and stared out the window. He didn't want to look too stressed out to his mother, nor did he feel inclined to discuss this subject any further, so he chose to walk the path of least resistance.

"Fine," he agreed. "We can go."

"Great!" Raine exclaimed exuberantly. She looked beautiful as she was smiling at him so excitedly. He didn't understand... How could someone as radiant and stunning as her ever be attracted to a man as dark and serious as Kato?

'_Shit... That's right. There's him, too.'_

"Hey, Mom," Squall started, feeling a knot in his throat. She noticed the nervous edge to his voice, and her smile vanished.

"What is it, Squall?" she asked.

"Please... don't tell Kato about the dance."

"What?"

She seemed startled, and despite everything, he understood. Her husband was her companion, her ally, the one she confided in... why should she keep any secrets from him, especially one as harmless as this?

'_Because he is a sick son of a bitch, that's why.'_

"Don't tell him that I'm going to that dance with Seifer," Squall continued stoically, trying to shake off the feelings of hatred throbbing inside of him at the mere thought of Kato. "Please."

"But why, honey?" she asked. He could see the confusion in her cobalt blue eyes. She was obviously getting suspicious over his unusual request.

Perhaps this hadn't been such a good idea.

No. Perhaps he was a total _fucking_ idiot.

"I just..." he started, then stopped to rearrange his sentence. He wasn't entirely sure what to say. "... I'd rather he didn't know."

"What are you worried about?" she inquired, her inflection serious. "Is something wrong?"

"No," he answered quickly, shaking his head. "I just don't think he'd like the idea of me going to a dance with another guy. It's not... very manly. I mean... I should be going with a girl... and... I'm going with Seifer instead. It just... doesn't look right."

"You worry too much, love," she sighed, now leaning across the bed to place one hand on her son's thigh. His gaze was blank. "Kato would have nothing against it, I'm sure. Let me talk to him, okay?"

"But—"

"Squall... Are you afraid he might think that you're gay?"

He raised both eyebrows at her unexpected, and decidedly blunt question. He probably would have blushed or given a furious response of some kind, hadn't he been so completely shocked into silence. Her eyes were fixated upon his, expecting an answer that he couldn't give to her, because he didn't have one.

He felt cornered and put on the spot. She was his mother, and he loved her, more than anything, but right now he wished that she had never entered his room that night.

This conversation had to end. Now.

"Whatever," he said, a strange pitch to his voice as he slid out of the reach of her hand. His face was a mask as he closed himself off from her. "Tell him I'm going. I don't care. It's fine. I don't even know why I was asking you not to tell him."

When everything was said and done, he'd rather deal with Kato's violent anger than with his mother's dangerous inquisitiveness.

Raine slowly retracted her hand. She was gazing upon her son thoughtfully, almost as if she was considering to say something else, but thought better of it. She realized that he hadn't denied her assumption, nor admitted to it. There was no reprimand in her eyes... no confusion, no curiosity. Had Squall really watched his mother that moment, he would have realized that the expression on her face was one of resignation. An expression that he hadn't seen on her in many, many years.

"I'm going to bed," Squall stated, standing up and moving his covers to the side, as if to demonstrate his point. "Night, Mom."

"Okay," she muttered, slowly getting up. "Good night, Squall. Get some sleep."

He glanced at her, realizing that she wasn't being her usual self. Reluctantly, he forced his lips into a half-hearted smile and declared calmly, "You should get some sleep too, Mom. You look tired."

She nodded, looking upon him lovingly, yet with a hint of uncertainty. "I will, Squall. Good night. See you in the morning."

So he watched her walking out of his room, carefully closing the door behind herself as she left. The sound of her footsteps descending the staircase to the master bedroom faded eventually, but Squall remained beside his half-made bed for a long time, wondering just how much longer he would be able to keep his world from completely falling apart.

* * *

"_Your father is a wonderful man, darling, believe me. Please, Squall, don't be angry with him."_

"_Why isn't he here, then? Why isn't he with us?"_

"_Sometimes, a mommy and a daddy can't be together. Your father and I are like that."_

"_Why?"_

"_You will understand when you get older, sweetheart."_

"_But I want to understand now!"_

"_Now is not the time... I'm sorry, Squall. I'm so sorry."_

_..._

"_You're just like him. Your family means nothing to you."_

"_I'm not like him. I **never** will be!"_

"_You're going to run away when your mother and sister need you the most."_

"_No. No. I'm not like that!"_

"_Then prove it."_

_..._

"_It hurts. Please, stop. Please."_

"_You'll get used to it, Squall."_

"_No..."_

"_Just bear with it."_

"_No, no, I can't. I don't want to. It hurts."_

"_You don't even know what pain feels like."_

"_Stop. Please, stop. Please!"_

"_No, Squall."_

"_I thought you were my father... I thought you loved me..."_

"_I do, Squall. I love you more than anyone in this world could ever love you."_

"_Then why are you doing this? Why?"_

"_Don't you understand? This is sex. This is how people show their affection for each other; by making love, Squall. It's okay. You'll understand eventually."_

"_I don't want to understand! I want it to stop! We're family! This isn't right! I know it isn't!"_

"_... Very well. Who would you have take your place, then? You choose. Your mother, or your sister?"_

"_W-what?"_

"_If you can't take it, one of them will."_

"_No..."_

"_Who shall it be? Your mother, or your little sister? Tell me, Squall. Who do you want me to fuck, the way I fuck you?"_

"_You can't... You __**can't**__!"_

"_Watch me. You know, come to think of it... I think Ellone's body would feel even better than yours does."_

"**NO**!"

With an agonizing scream, Squall awoke. His pulse was racing, and cold sweat beaded along his neckline. Even as he was conscious, he saw the sickening images from his nightmare flashing before his eyes. He was gasping for air, nauseated to his stomach. Everything was turning around him. There was a sharp pain in the back of his throat; tears that wouldn't come to him, because he was hurting too much to even be able to cry. Fear was grasping his insides, twisting them painfully. He could hardly even take a breath.

"Squall?"

Still disoriented, he looked around. He had been slumped down in the squashy green couch in the break room at Ward's Diner. His hair stuck to his skin; he had been sweating. With a shiver, he tried to focus on his surroundings.

Only then did he notice the muscular pair of legs in washed out blue jeans and half-laced boots perched on the arm rest of the couch, right next to him.

"What..."

Swiping the person an upward glance, he was surprised to find Seifer sitting to his left side, wearing a dark grey t-shirt and a small frown on his handsome face. For a moment, Squall's eyes drifted shut.

'_I'm at work. In the break room. I must've fallen asleep. I don't remember...'_

"Squall, what the fuck is the matter with you?"

The brunette blinked and adjusted his gaze upwards once more, meeting eyes of startling viridian green. Seifer was sitting on the arm rest of the couch, studying him skeptically. He had placed one hand against the left side of Squall's neck and shoulder.

Squall hadn't even noticed.

"What are you doing here...?" the brunette asked, struggling as he was forming the sentence. His mind was still sluggish from a sleep that had done nothing to revitalize him.

"Selphie told me you were in here, taking a nap," Seifer explained matter-of-factly, as if he'd rather be talking about something else. When Squall shifted, he removed his hand from the brunette's body. "She said you came in way too early for your shift."

"Oh. Right..." Squall acknowledged, the words trickling away.

He had already forgotten that he had showed up for work at 8am – three hours earlier than scheduled. The lack of sleep had hit him around 1pm, after the lunch rush, and he had retreated into the break room to take a nap until his mother and Ellone would show for their visit.

He hadn't expected Seifer's presence, however.

"Why are you here?" Squall asked, essentially repeating his question from before.

Seifer sighed.

"I came by to hang out with you for a bit," the blond muttered, resting his chin in the palm of his right hand. He wasn't displaying his usual, trademark smirk. "Selphie told me to look for you in here. You were knocked out, having some shit piece of a nightmare."

"I see..." Squall acknowledged, looking uncomfortable.

"You were screaming at the top of your lungs when I sat down. I wasn't even trying to wake you up until I noticed how badly you were sleeping."

This time, Squall said nothing. Instead, he leaned forward and perched his elbows on his knees. His head was pounding. He still felt slightly sick to his stomach.

"You feeling better now?" Seifer asked, eliciting a weak nod from Squall's end.

"I'm fine."

"I'm guessing you're not gonna tell me what the nightmare was about?" Seifer asked, almost cynically.

"... It was just a dream," Squall sighed quietly.

"A dream about what? It sounded pretty ugly."

Distractedly, Squall looked around, trying to change the subject. "Have you seen my mom and sister somewhere?"

"Yeah, actually, I have," Seifer responded, gesturing at the door that lead back out of the break room and into the restaurant. "I was sitting at a table with them until I went looking for you. They're both outside."

"I should go, then," Squall stated, already half on his feet, when Seifer leaned forward and slowly pushed him back into the seat.

"Give it a minute," the blond said in a gruff tone of voice that didn't lack gentleness. Squall glanced up at him in confusion. "You still look a bit out of it."

Squall returned his gaze to his knees. He didn't have a mirror, but he figured that he didn't need one to acknowledge that Seifer had a point.

The brunette didn't _feel_ like himself.

For some strange reason, Seifer's presence didn't bother him, either, despite the fact that he felt vulnerable, stripped from his usual defenses. He was still seeing the room and Seifer through a fog of memories that he couldn't fully push away yet. The dream had been fast-paced and vivid, moving quickly from one moment in time to another. He remembered the fear and agony he had felt back then; he could still feel them now. They had never been more real.

His stomach was revolting even harder.

He knew that lurching sensation and the sourness in his throat. Jerkily, he stood up from the couch, and his gaze drifted towards the unisex bathroom that was located to his right.

"Squall, what—"

"Bathroom," Squall mumbled, afraid to say much more than that.

With that, he hastily disappeared into the restroom, slamming the door shut. Seifer, who was still sitting on the arm rest of the couch, merely stared, debating on whether to follow the brunette or not.

'_What's the point? My guess is he's probably in there puking right now. He looked like he was about to hurl any minute. What am __**I**__ supposed to do to make it better? Hold his fuckin' hair? Jesus.'_

Rolling his eyes, Seifer turned his focus to the black apron that had been folded neatly and placed on the coffee table in front of him. Slowly, his eyebrows drew together as he picked it up and held it in his hands. Before he knew it, his mind was wandering to his brunette love interest once more.

'_If he'd just fuckin' __**talk**__ to me! Every time we hang out I practically have to pry him open like a fuckin' oyster! Ugh. This shit's seriously getting old.'_

He stood up and stretched his legs, then walked around the coffee table. He stopped in front of the bathroom door, carefully listening for noises, but there was nothing.

'_Man, he's such a pain in the ass. Guess I better make sure he's alright.'_

"Hey, you alright in there? Squall!" Seifer hollered, beating his fist against the door. When he got no response, he tried to turn the doorknob, but it was locked from the inside. "Open the damn door, Squall."

Of course, the thing didn't budge – not that Seifer had seriously expected it to. Impatiently, he performed another series of demanding thuds on the door, before crossing his arms and threatening, "You either let me in right now, or I'm kicking the fucking door in!"

He was surprised to hear Squall flushing the toilet. Then, he heard a faint, metallic clicking sound and saw Squall slowly pulling the door ajar. The brunette's eyes were cold and narrow as they met with Seifer's, seething with spite.

To Seifer's relief, Squall didn't really look like he'd just gotten reacquainted with his lunch or anything.

All in all, he really just looked pissed off.

"You just have to be a fucking pest, don't you?" Squall growled, obviously finding any possible response from Seifer entirely irrelevant as he simply shoved the blond aside and strode through the room towards the door that lead back into the restaurant.

Seifer turned to watch him, a quick grin on his lips. "Hey, princess," he leered. "You forgot your dress."

Squall gave him a look of pure loathing, biting, "What the hell do you mean?" when Seifer threw his apron across the small room and into his face.

"Cheer up," Seifer ordered with a cocky smirk. "Your pissy attitude is totally wasted on me. I still think you're fuckin' hot, so just give it a rest already."

"Shut up," Squall growled, tying the apron around his hips with a frown. Then, to Seifer's surprise, he looked up and gave the blond a gaze that seemed full of resolve. Finally, he snapped, "Are you coming, or what?"

"I'm going to in a minute," Seifer said, mildly surprised by the order. "I gotta take a leak first."

"Whatever," Squall acknowledged with a with a grim scowl, before walking out of the room.

Sighing, Seifer shook his head.

"Well, ain't little miss sunshine just in a sparkly fuckin' mood today," the blond mused as he stepped into the bathroom. As he closed the door, he noticed an odd smell lingering in the room. It was a fruity, heavy kind of scent that was probably supposed to smell pleasant, but didn't really strike him that way.

'_Air freshener,'_ Seifer thought, clicking his tongue as he noticed the can of "Tropical Mist" aerosol spray sitting on the sink. _'He must've been covering something up. He didn't have enough time to take a dump. So he __**did**__ throw up after all. Idiot. Why didn't he say anything? And why did he have to throw up? He sure does that a lot.'_

As Seifer distractedly finished his business and washed his hands, he finally made a mental connection between Squall having a nightmare, and the brunette's abrupt urge to regurgitate. He realized that the two strings of events were connected somehow, but he couldn't quite figure out why.

'_Who the hell has nightmares so bad that they make you wanna vomit? Last time I saw him doing this was when we were making out at my place. He wasn't sleeping then, though. Maybe he was having a flashback or something? But a flashback of __**what**__? Shit. Why would having sex trigger any flashbacks? What happened to him? I wonder if it has anything to do with that Aren guy. I'd bet that's gotta be it. He was probably thinking about them having sex back then, or something. Maybe that's what he was dreaming about earlier? Dammit. It'd really help if he talked in his sleep or something. What did that fucker do to him to mess him up like this?'_

With a sound of displeasure, Seifer walked out of the bathroom. He was feeling irritable all of a sudden; he didn't like the fact that Squall was hiding something from him, especially something that seemed to have such a profound effect on the brunette's well-being. Every time they seemed to be getting closer, something would happen that would drive them further apart.

Seifer felt like he was treading water here.

'_Fuck it. I'll figure it out. I'm tired of this shit.'_

He pushed the door to the restaurant open, trying to make his way back to the table where he had left Raine and Ellone, but as soon as he had set foot in the hallway outside the door, his determination screeched to a sudden halt. He had expected the hallway before him to be empty, but it wasn't; Squall was standing with his back against a wall, cornered by two guys whose faces Seifer's memory couldn't immediately place. The brunette was facing Seifer now, past one guy's arm that had been placed next to his head in order to trap him in place. Grey blue eyes were flashing at him through a curtain of wispy, dark brown bangs, in a mixture of anger and helplessness that immediately caused Seifer's protective instincts to kick in.

"Hey! What the fuck's going on here?" Seifer barked, immediately taking two steps in the direction of the three males. The two high school age boys that had been crowding Squall quickly stepped back, if only to re-assess the situation.

"Shit, it's that Almasy dude again," one of them muttered, giving the blond a disconcerted look. "Fucker's everywhere, Jesus."

Finally, Seifer recognized their faces. They were Jeff and one of his cronies – the guys that had tripped Squall in gym class a few days ago. The memory caused Seifer's expression to darken. He swiped a quick glance at Squall; the brunette was still standing against the wall. He didn't look harmed, nor did he look scared. But there was an expression on his face that Seifer knew; a panic, running deep beneath the surface, a look he had when he wanted to run away but forced himself not to.

"The hell do you think you're doing?" Seifer asked, turning away from Squall to advance in the other males' direction.

"Look, Squall, I think your new boyfriend's angry," Jeff leered nastily, but he watched Seifer's figure very closely. "You bitches are like attached at the hip or somethin'."

"Fuck off," Squall spat, glaring at the other teen.

"You got somethin' you wanna discuss, cock burn?" Seifer snarled at Jeff, his eyes glittering dangerously. There was an edge of blood lust to his voice; a promise of hurt, more so than a threat.

Jeff merely made a wry grimace and waved his hand dismissively in Seifer's direction. "Nah, I think I got my point across."

Then, he regarded Squall with a long, malicious grin. "See you around, princess."

Squall snorted angrily, but said nothing. He lowered his head and didn't watch how the two boys retreated out of sight. Seifer, on the other hand, was witnessing their escape with a look of repulsion and aggression; something inside of him was itching to go after them and work off a bit of his frustration, especially on the head asshole, Jeff. Really, his right fist would have fit beautifully in that fucker's face.

"Useless dickholes," Seifer hissed under his breath, before veering around to confront his brunette friend. Squall was still staring at the floor, his eyes looking fixed and unfocused. Immediately, the murderous frown on Seifer's face smoothed out, and he approached the younger male cautiously.

"Hey, you alright?" he asked, his voice low as he inclined his head towards Squall's.

The brunette nodded, but didn't look up. "I'm fine."

"Where did they suddenly come from?" Seifer asked, swiping another glance in the direction that the other boys had departed in. "And what the fuck did they want from you?"

"Don't know," Squall muttered, drawing a breath through his nose that sounded almost like a sniffle. "Don't care."

He pushed himself off the wall, turning in the direction of the main part of the restaurant, when Seifer suddenly grabbed his right arm and yanked him back around. Startled, Squall's head shot up, and the blond could feel him tensing in his grasp as he flicked him a look of sheer revolt.

"What the he—"

"**No**, fuck this, don't even start! You're not going anywhere, alright? You're staying and telling me what the fuck is going on here!" Seifer cut him off harshly, pulling the brunette dangerously close. "How stupid do you think I am?"

Squall drew his brows together, blue eyes flickering. Angrily, he shifted in Seifer's hold. "Let go, asshole!" he snapped, trying to snatch back his arm.

"No, _fuck_ that."

"You fucking shit, I'll—"

"I'm not _dumb_, Squall," Seifer hissed, bringing his face close enough to Squall's to study every little speck and grain of color in the brunette's stark blue eyes. "If you don't wanna tell me what's going on, fine, have it your way – but don't you dare fucking lie to me!"

The dark haired boy swallowed, opened his mouth – and simply remained silent. His eyes drifted to the floor once more, and his body slackened in Seifer's hold. As quickly as his anger had built up, it had already dissipated once more.

There was resignation and guilt in the disarmingly handsome lines of his face that Seifer had never seen there before. He didn't know when or how, but something inside the frigid brunette had been broken; his attitude was not the same as it had been a few days ago. He was quicker to anger, but easier to soothe. His mind seemed to be in a volatile state. Seifer didn't believe that Squall was intentionally blowing up on him, but it almost felt as if the brunette couldn't really help himself.

Squall Leonhart seemed to be getting completely out of control.

"What's going on with you today?" Seifer asked, his voice a soft, concerned murmur now. "Something's not right."

"I don't know," Squall answered helplessly, shaking his head. He looked dazed and burdened with unspoken troubles. "I'm... sorry."

"Talk to me," Seifer said huskily, his eyes burning into Squall's. "What did Jeff want from you?"

"He didn't... _want_ anything from me..." Squall sighed, grasping the side of his head as if he was in pain. "It's not about _me_. At least... not entirely. It's about my stepfather, Kato."

"What?"

Squall leaned against the wall, frowning. His gaze drifted aimlessly around the hallway. When he spoke again, he grimaced uncomfortably in Seifer's direction.

"My stepfather is a lawyer who was involved in a pretty big law suit involving Jeff's father's construction company, about two years back," Squall explained, gesturing vaguely. Opening up about the past seemed difficult for him. "Jeff's father was the defendant. He ended up losing the court battle and going bankrupt. Kato was on the plaintiff's side. It was a big case, and for a while, it was all over the news. Kato made a lot of money off that case."

"So Jeff's bitter because of your old man?"

"Because of my stepfather," Squall corrected him. "It's a stupid, childish grudge he's been holding, and if there's anything that asshole is good at, it's holding grudges. I mean, we were never exactly friends or anything, but this only made things worse. Jeff acts like the whole thing is my fault, but I had nothing to do with it."

"Obviously not," Seifer agreed. "He's just looking for someone to blame."

"There were... a lot of discrepancies during the court hearings," Squall continued hesitantly, swiping Seifer a quick, sideways glance. "Kato knows the judges around here pretty well. The defendant's side accused the judge in charge of that particular case of favoritism and acceptance of bribery, but failed. In the end... I don't know what went down. I didn't follow the case at all, because I don't give a damn about what Kato does. And if he had done anything fishy, it's not like he would have asked my permission, anyway."

Seifer noted the bitterness in Squall's tone, the subtle hints of aversion whenever he voiced Kato's name. Obviously, Squall had no love lost on that man. Not that Seifer could blame him; the blond had disliked Squall's stepfather from the moment he had first laid eyes on him at Deling City High School. Hearing this story that involved possible corruption on Kato's part only fueled Seifer's dislike for the man further.

"You and your stepfather don't get along at all, do you?" Seifer asked, not necessarily expecting an informative response, or any response at all, for that matter. He had asked this question before, after first meeting Kato, and Squall hadn't seemed willing to indulge in the topic of the head of his family. To his surprise, Squall shrugged his shoulders slightly and crossed his arms in front of his chest.

"No," the brunette answered truthfully. "We don't."

"I see," Seifer acknowledged. "Why is that?"

"I couldn't tell you," Squall said in response. "I don't know myself. I don't know what went wrong. It was easier when I was a kid, but... it's not anymore. I don't look at him as my father. I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I never had anything like a father," Squall grumbled, his tone slipping. "Just a bunch of men vying for that position... or at least a place in my mother's bed."

Seifer raised a brow. "What?"

Chuckling sardonically, Squall shook his head. "Nevermind."

"Was it really that bad when you were younger?" Seifer asked, trying to hold Squall's gaze with his own. He was still touching the boy's arm, grasping it gently.

"No," Squall finally answered, and there was just the tiniest, saddest of smiles playing at the corner of his lips. "It wasn't."

"But—"

"My mom protected me from anything bad. She made sure I had a happy childhood, no matter what it took. I didn't have a father, but she was enough parent to make up for that deficit," Squall murmured, sounding unspeakably proud.

"She's one kick-ass woman," Seifer agreed.

"Yeah," Squall said, his voice finally trailing off. His face looked distant, consumed by the past. Eventually, he shook his head.

"Anyway, I need to get back to work," he explained, looking more peaceful than he had all day.

"You gonna have lunch with your family and myself first, or what?" Seifer asked, grinning. "Remember, I came out here for some food and some eye candy. The chow is on the menu... _you_ aren't."

"Whatever," Squall shrugged, rubbing his nose in a gesture of embarrassment.

"So, you gonna hang out for a bit?" Seifer prodded.

"Yeah... sure."

"Alright, that's what I'm talkin' about!" Seifer exclaimed, ushering Squall out of the hallway with a big smile that radiated happiness. "Let's get us some fuckin' food!"

And Squall followed the other male's lead, knowing that he had diverted disaster once more, even if that fleeting moment of peace in his life came at a price that he hadn't even begun to fully understand.

...

_"__You can't run away. Not from me. I will be in control of your life for as long as you're able to __**breathe**__. If you think I'll ever let you go, you're mistaken. I would break you before that day ever comes."_

_"__I thought you wanted to be my father..."_

_"__I lied."_

* * *

Another update that took me forever. I'm so sorry. This one might seem a bit random and cluster-fucked, but I hope you enjoy it anyway. I'm trying to shorten my original plot concept a little in order to get things going. Hopefully, it'll work out in the story's favor. I'm not sure how else I'll get it done before the year of, oh, 2050 :P

Hope you all enjoyed. TTYL!


	25. Dive

-:-  
**Chapter 25  
****Dive**

"_Have you heard one thing that I've said?"  
_-:-

She was a queen  
Lost within a dream  
Misconceived that he was fit to reign  
Lies take victims  
Separate them at the seams  
Cause them to fall apart  
Then move along to better things now

She wants to fall in love again  
Don't you know that he  
Is satisfied to own her.

_"Broken Like An Angel" - Crossfade_

-:-

"... And then the aliens came and invaded the city! Big, blue, bug-eyed aliens with pink bowties around their necks! They flew into town in spaceships that looked like frogs."

"What? Frogs? Really, Seifie?"

"Absolutely! If you'd honk the horn of the spaceship, it would quack! Like this: _quack, quack_! Quaaaaack!"

"Seifie! Frogs don't quack... they ribbit! Like this... _rrribbit_!"

The brunette male riding in the passenger seat of Seifer Almasy's red pick-up truck let out an abrupt snort of laughter. With storm blue eyes glittering in amusement, he swiped a glance at his little sister that was wedged in between him and Seifer on her booster seat. She was giggling as they were riding down the road and the brawny blond next to her was telling her animated stories of aliens attacking Balamb from outer space - sound effects included.

"Oh, they ribbit, huh? Are you sure?" Seifer asked, chuckling. He threw Squall a quick, intense gaze over the girl's head, grinning contently when he saw that the brunette was looking back at him.

Ellone nodded fiercely, and her little legs were flailing on the booster seat as she tried to imitate a jumping frog. "Yes, they _do_!" she exclaimed stubbornly. "They ribbit! And ducks quack! Like this, okay? Quack! Quack, quack!"

"Yeah, quack, quack, Seifer..." Squall murmured softly, a sarcastic undertone to his low, rasp voice. When Ellone wasn't looking in his direction, he quickly flipped Seifer the bird, leering playfully. "Quack, quack."

"Well, aren't you two just a critical bunch," Seifer laughed, regarding the pair with a sideways glance, faking hurt. Ellone seemed to be having a blast in their company, and even Squall looked uncharacteristically relaxed at the girl's side with just a hint of a wry smirk flickering on his face.

They had left Ward's Diner about fifteen minutes ago and headed for Perkins Park, which was located near Squall's and Ellone's home; the very same park where Seifer had found Squall on that fateful night not too long ago, his wrists cut up and bleeding, his soul somewhere between cracked and broken on the top floor of that jungle gym. For an abrupt moment, that memory carved itself through Seifer's mind like a knife, and the bright grin on his lips slipped as he remembered the darkness and anguish of that night.

He almost couldn't believe that the calm, stoic brunette male to his right was the same one who had clung to his own life by merely a thread that day, hidden in the shadows amongst his own misery, never expecting nor wanting to be found.

'... _But __**I **__found you. And I'll be damned before I'm just going to let you go. You deserve someone who'll be there for you, no matter how dark it gets around you, and no matter how much you just wanna put an end to it all. __**I**__'ll be that someone. I don't care what it takes.'_

Seifer shook his head, goose bumps prickling on his forearms as he changed his focus to the road in front of them. Ellone was giggling by his side, playing with the Barbie doll that her mother had bought for her right before their lunch at Ward's Diner. They had spent over two hours at the brunette's workplace, talking, laughing and having an overall hell of a time. Seifer could hardly even remember what he ate, but he remembered staring at Squall throughout the entire meal, amazed by how much his friend perked up when he was around his family. When Ell had eventually asked Squall to take her to the playground at the park, Seifer had offered to go with them, and after some initial reluctance (and a bit of coaxing from his mother's end) Squall had agreed to leave with Ellone and Seifer near the end of his shift.

So here they were, riding in Seifer's pick-up truck, Ellone on her booster seat that they had taken from Raine's van, and Squall by her side in the passenger seat. It had gotten colder outside; Ell was wearing a fluffy pink coat, and Squall had put on a grey hooded zip up sweater and his black biker jacket. Even Seifer had bothered to wear a light brown, fashionably scuffed up looking leather jacket of his own, and he enjoyed the fact that Ell had snuggled against him more than once to tell him how soft it was.

Even now, she was leaning against him, tugging on his coat pocket, trying to fit her new Barbie doll inside.

'_She's a lot cuddlier than her older brother, that's for sure.'_

Squall was looking out the window, watching the scenery as usual, but he would glance over occasionally to monitor his sister's doings. He admired Seifer's patience and sweetness towards his sibling from afar, both intrigued and concerned at the same time. He was glad that Ellone was enjoying herself so much around Seifer, but Squall had learned that every bit of happiness in his life came at a price that was hell to pay. Kato didn't care when he was sad, hurt or upset, but when he was genuinely in a good mood, the man always became suspicious. Squall didn't know whether Kato was jealous, or if the man just hated him so much that he couldn't stand the idea of Squall being happy. Either way, it didn't make a difference. No matter how much he liked Seifer and genuinely appreciated the blond's company, Squall still found himself panicking during their random moments of silence, his throat tight as he pictured the consequences of his affection for the other male.

_'There's no chance in hell I'll get away with this.'_

Shivering, he turned to the side, wishing that he could wipe out these shapeless fears looming in the back of his mind, or at least keep them from constantly pushing to the surface. He had _chosen_ to allow Seifer into his life; he knew he would have to endure more pain and suffering because of the blond, but in the end, this had been his decision alone. _He_ had made the choice to keep Seifer around, and _he_ would have to face the consequences. He only wished that he could simply accept this fact, instead of constantly worrying about it.

He hated himself for being so weak.

'_I'm not even worried about myself. It's Ell and Mom that I worry about. I want them to be safe. As long as Kato lets his anger out on me, I don't care. I can handle it. I just—'_

"**Gonna run my fingers through your long black hair, squeeze you tighter than a grizzly bear, uh-uh-uh, yes sir-ee, uh uh, yeah, I'm gonna stick like glue, stick because I'm stuck on you!"**

Blinking, Squall looked over at Seifer and his little sister. While he had been brooding, Ellone had leaned forward in her seat to play with the controls of Seifer's stereo that was located right in front of her. Whatever station she had managed to find, Seifer seemed to dig it, because he was singing along to the lyrics of the song at the top of his lungs, much to the amusement of little Ell. Squall stared at the two of them in bewilderment, cringing eventually as Ellone turned up the volume.

"What the _hell_?" the brunette quipped quizzically, drawing his eyebrows together. "Uh... is that Elvis Presley?"

Ell was bouncing in her seat to the rhythm, giggling "Elvis Pressy!", and Seifer merely smirked, winking suggestively in Squall's direction as he continued to sing.

"**Hide in the kitchen, hide in the hall, ain't gonna do you no good at all, cause once I catch ya and the kissin' starts, a team o' wild horses couldn't tear us apart!"**

"Oh, fucking gracious," Squall groaned, covering his face in his hand. When he looked up, Seifer was still singing, shimmying from side to side, with Ellone imitating his every move, crooning an off-beat, off-pitch melody. Squall had never seen anything more ridiculous, but the two looked so goddamn hysterical, he couldn't help but get a laugh out of it.

With a resigned look on his face, he shook his head.

"You gotta be kidding me," he sighed, and a smile leaked across his face. "You two are completely hopeless."

"Next song, Ell!" Seifer commanded blithely, ignoring Squall's teasing comment. "Next song!"

Seifer took Ellone's small hand and guided it to the "next track" button on the blond's CD player, which she pushed in excitement. Squall quirked a brow in response.

'_Are you shitting me? It's a fucking CD? I thought they were listening to the radio.'_

"**Lord Almighty, I feel my temperature rising, higher and higher, it's burning through to my soul. Girl, girl, girl, you're gonna set me on fire, my brain is flaming, I don't know which way to go! Your kisses lift me higher, like the sweet song of a choir, you light my morning sky - with burning love!"**

And there they were, jumping around in their seats and singing along to the songs on Seifer's goddamn Elvis Presley CD. Squall didn't quite know what to do with himself, other than to watch the two most goofy human beings he had set sight on in a long freakin' time. Seifer and Ellone were like two silly peas in a pod, giggling and laughing and acting completely out of control.

'_He's cracked in the head... completely mental,' _Squall thought as he studied Seifer's glowing face. _'But... I actually kind of like it.'_

It was impossible for the brunette to be thoughtful and gloomy while his two companions were belting those old fashioned feel-good songs so loudly that their throats would probably be sore before long. The memory hadn't even struck him initially, but when he thought about it, he remembered his mother listening to Elvis Presley songs a lot during her pregnancy with Ellone. Squall had found Raine dancing through the house to the cheerful tunes on more than one occasion, and he had joined her every time, whirling with her around the room, strengthening that bond between them that was much deeper than words could ever express.

'_Mom is an amazing dancer... she always was, even before I was born. I'm sure she passed her talent on to Ellone. I can't believe I forgot all about this...'_

There was a certain newfound fondness in his heart towards Seifer for bringing back those joyful memories that he had already forgotten several years ago. So many of his blissful childhood memories had been buried under the pain and suffering that Kato had brought upon him.

It was almost as if he had never been a child at all.

'_No... that's not true. I had a great childhood, despite everything. Mom always made sure I was happy. That never really changed, even now. I owe her so much. I will do for Ell what Mom did for me: I'll make sure she's safe and happy and well taken care of, no matter what I'll have to deal with. Kato can do whatever he wants to me... but I'll **kill** him if he lays a hand on Ellone.'_

"Hey, don't be looking so moody over there, Sir Glaresalot!" Seifer snickered from the other end of the bench seat. He had turned down the volume of the music, although Squall could still hear "Can't Help Falling In Love With You" bumbling in the background. Both Seifer and Ell were looking back at him, their faces flushed from the excitement.

With some trouble, Squall faked a smile, if only for his little sister's sake. "What? Are you two done singing already?" he asked, poking Ell in the side playfully. She giggled in response.

"Yes! Are we there yet?" the girl asked, impatience pouring into her voice as she strained her neck to look outside the window. To Squall's surprise, they had already pulled into one of the parking lots near the playground.

"Yup. Your able bodied chauffeur, Seifer, is honored to tell Mylady that we have arrived," the blond announced with mock seriousness. As he put his truck into park and turned off the engine, Ellone was already scrambling to get out of her seat.

"Hey, slow down, turbo!" Squall chuckled, twisting around to undo his sister's seatbelt. Then, he opened his door and jumped out of the truck, only to turn around and open his arms towards Ellone.

"Come on!" he motioned, smiling at her. She leapt into his arms with much laughter, and he held her tight for just one moment, simply cherishing the fact that she was healthy and alive, not cold and lifeless as she had been on that night after the snowstorm, three years ago.

She struggled in his embrace, wanting to be put down. With a small, inaudible sigh, he let her go. As he placed her on the ground, she jumped in circles, ready to take off running.

"Hey, Ell, you want your Barbie back?" Seifer asked loudly. He had appeared from behind the truck and stepped up next to Squall. The girl's doll was still sticking out of his pocket.

"No, you carry her!" Ellone commanded, causing Seifer to snort in amusement and exchange glances with Squall, who looked pleasantly humored.

"Fair enough," Seifer agreed in defeat, before a sudden idea crossed his mind. "Hey, Miss Ell... I wanna hold your hand! May I? It'd be a great honor, you know."

The petite brunette preschooler gave Seifer a long, thoughtful stare, as if she truly had to contemplate the blond's request. Her cute little face screwed up just the tiniest bit, and she nodded sternly.

"Yes, but only if you and big brother hold hands, too!"

With a small gulp and a puzzled expression, Seifer swiped a quick glance at Squall. The brunette looked as if someone had just creamed him over the back of the head with a frying pan. His eyes were wide as he gazed from Ellone to Seifer, who was reciprocating his looks with an air of uncertainty. Squall didn't know what to say. He couldn't figure out a simple way to explain to his sister that him and Seifer couldn't walk around holding hands, simply because it was inappropriate, possibly dangerous, and generally frowned upon by society. Her young, unprejudiced mind would never comprehend that sort of logic. In the hearts of young children, love was without societal restraint; it was pure and unguarded, given freely to anyone they deemed deserving. The terms "heterosexual" and "homosexual" meant nothing to them.

'_What the hell am I supposed to tell her?'_

Seifer saw the discomfort in Squall's face and the nervous glare in his eyes. He was holding his arms to his chest, grinding the heels of his boots in the gravel as he was looking helplessly at his younger sister. Seifer didn't know what was going on inside Squall's head, but he had a pretty solid idea. Part of him wanted to wait and see what the brunette would say, but the rest of him couldn't stand to see Squall squirming.

"How about we both get to hold _your_ hand?" Seifer suggested in a warm, persuasive way as he knelt down before Ellone to be on the same eye-level as the five year old. He held out one hand, which she regarded with interest. "I'll hold one of your hands, and Squall holds the other. How about that?"

Ellone didn't have to think long on that proposition. The thought of holding both her brother's and Seifer's hand obviously appealed to her much. With a quick giggle and an excited nod, she grabbed Seifer's extended hand. The blond looked content as he stood up and walked her towards her older brother. Seifer was pleasantly surprised by the look on Squall's face; he had never quite seen anything like it before. There was gratitude glowing in the exotic grey blue of Squall's eyes, and something that was much closer to affection than Seifer had ever expected from the brunette. Squall was just standing there, staring at Seifer, pale and insecure and full of emotions that he didn't know how to express.

Seifer merely smiled.

"Let's go."

And as Ellone stretched out her hand, Squall grasped it readily, mouthing a silent "thank you" in Seifer's direction. The blond was relieved to see a small crack in Squall's façade of utter indifference, and he nodded in return. He hadn't done much, he figured, but he had learned by now that it didn't take any extravagant gestures to move his frigid brunette friend.

Simple ways of showing that he cared usually seemed to suffice, and although the brunette required a whole well of patience, Seifer didn't even mind so much anymore.

Somehow, Squall's presence had made his whole existence more worthwhile. Yeah, it was a cheesy thought alright, but he was closer to a state of complete happiness and satisfaction than he had ever been in his entire life. He had honestly never imagined that he would ever fall in love with someone – that he would feel the urge to do whatever it took to magically put a smile on someone else's face. Truthfully, he had always been rather selfish, and he had never thought that he'd long for more in his life than materialistic things and a quick lay with no strings attached. These days, the prospect of making Squall feel good inspired selfless acts from Seifer that he had never had the interest to perform before.

Seifer had never been an unhappy kind of guy; he knew how to have fun, and he was always surrounded by friends and flings alike. He had money, "toys" and a handful of family members that genuinely loved him. He had on no account lacked anything that a young adult could want or need, except perhaps for parental direction and guidance as he had grown up. When he was perfectly honest with himself, however, he had always felt the subdued inkling that something important was missing from the grand scheme that made up his life, but he had never spent much thought on the concept as a whole.

His life may not have been perfect, but it had always been good enough.

Now, he finally understood the difference between 'good enough' and true, honest-to-god happiness_. _He had found something of significance; a guy that meant so much to him that he strove to be a better person just for that boy's sake. He'd catch himself thinking about Squall throughout the day, smiling stupidly to himself as if he was the class fucking retard. On the contrary, Seifer had actually started to study for school to improve his grades, not only because he wanted to follow Squall to any college of his choosing, but also because he wanted to be someone that the brunette would see as something of an intellectual equal, instead of just another dumb football jock.

'_Oh yeah, I know that's exactly what he thinks of me sometimes! Tsk. I'm a smart motherfucker, alright, I just choose to give my brain cells a rest every now and then. I pay attention to the shit that actually matters.'_

They had been walking towards the playground, with Ellone babbling randomly and Squall responding to her with the teasing love and astounding patience of a typical older brother. Seifer honestly enjoyed watching the two of them together. Squall seemed like a completely different person around his sister; he was caring, protective and almost unguarded... nothing like his usual frigid, untouchable self.

'_As much as he pretends to be a hard ass, his sister has him wrapped around her pinky finger. Too freakin' cute.'_

"Playground!" Ellone squealed, as soon as they had passed a trail that led to the park's lake and a cove of trees and flowers. The playground had come in sight, with many kids and parents already gathered at the sandbox and the jungle gym. The girl pulled against them, and after a moment of hesitation, the two boys decided to let her go. Ellone ran towards a girl that she knew from previous visits, and Squall nodded politely when the mother of the other preschooler waved in their direction.

"She's got a bunch of little friends here, huh? Your sister sure is popular," Seifer said as he watched how the two girls begun to build something in the cool white sand and other children quickly joined them. By his side, Squall was studying his sister attentively, standing with casual grace, motionless as a statue.

"Yeah," the brunette murmured. "Mom and I take her out here a lot."

"That's good," Seifer nodded distractedly, then pointed at a nearby park bench. "Hey, let's go and sit down, alright?"

He didn't wait for an answer. Instead, he shuffled over to the bench and sank onto the slightly cold wooden seat. He looked over at Squall, who was still standing in the same spot, looking back at him with a blank expression. Finally, the brunette shrugged and placed his hands in the pockets of his jacket, before languidly walking over to Seifer's side, where he eventually sat down, not saying one word. He was sitting slightly hunched over, an arm's length away from Seifer, his eyes trained on Ellone, as if he was afraid to lose sight of her.

"Your sister's a freakin' doll, you know that?" Seifer commented, snickering in amusement as he watched the kids horsing around with each other. "Kinda makes me wish my parents would have another baby, ya know, but that ain't gonna happen. My mother's _still_ whining about how much weight she gained when she was pregnant with me. I'll never hear the end of it. Hell, she's probably too old now, anyway."

"So you're an only child?" Squall concluded. His voice was mellow and a bit coarse, as if he was catching a cold.

"Yeah," Seifer said with a proud grin. "Spoiled rotten, too."

"You don't say," Squall replied cynically, but his tone was lacking its typical edge. Seifer could tell that the younger teen was simply poking fun at him.

"Nah, I don't think I was ever too spoiled," Seifer remarked with a shrug. He, too, had buried his hands in his coat pockets. He was watching the children at play, but his focus seemed to be someplace else.

Squall sneered. "Yeah, right."

Seifer heaved a long, heavy sigh. He seemed thoughtful, and uncharacteristically serious. His head was cocked back, and he was staring at the grey blue afternoon sky, which vaguely reminded him of the color of Squall's eyes. His blond hair was swaying lightly in the cold wind, and he looked more grown up than Squall had ever seen him before. The brunette watched him out of the corner of his eyes, searching for words that would break the silence, but simply didn't come to him.

"Well... honestly, my parents were always too busy to take care of me. They're both doctors, ya know," Seifer suddenly went on in a hushed, demure sort of way. He sounded so calm, and his mature seriousness immediately grabbed Squall's attention. "I guess they liked the idea of having a kid, but they really didn't have the time it takes to raise one properly. They figured they could just buy me a bunch of toys and pay a full-time nanny, and everything would work out fine. They really thought it was as simple as that. For two overly educated academics, they really are an extraordinarily stupid bunch."

When he saw the sad grimace on Seifer's face, Squall finally realized that he wasn't the only one without a picture-perfect childhood to call his own. The brunette suddenly felt very stupid for being so presumptuous and judgmental over Seifer's upbringing. He had always figured that Seifer had been too spoiled for his own good, and obviously his assumption hadn't been far from the truth; still, he had never questioned whether Seifer was even content with the way he had been raised.

"I'm sorry," Squall remarked contritely, devoid of anything more appropriate to say. As he shuffled his feet in the sand in discomfort, Seifer only smiled at him gently.

"Well, it wasn't all _that_ bad, really. My grandmother, Belle, my Dad's mother, didn't want me to be raised by some nanny, so she pretty much stayed with me most of the time when I was younger," the blond went on to explain his childhood in greater detail. To his surprise, Squall had turned to face him, although his gaze would still drift over to Ellone frequently.

"Your grandma raised you?" Squall inquired eventually, a carefully masked shade of curiosity to his voice. He was obviously trying not to pry.

"Yeah, more or less," Seifer nodded, beaming at the brunette. "I love her, man, she's awesome. She's the reason I actually turned out alright. She always made sure I got enough tough love from her and grandpa. I could have gotten into a lot more trouble than I did. They kept me straight for as long as they could. My grandma's totally fuckin' cool for her age, too! Maybe you'll get to meet her some day. Anyway... Uh, what about your grandparents?"

Squall's face unexpectedly fell, and his head veered to the side, away from Seifer. The blond noticed a sudden stiffness in the set of Squall's shoulder.

Obviously, he had struck a nerve.

"I've never met them," Squall murmured dully, and he wrapped his arms around his torso tightly. He suddenly looked so impossibly small and helpless that Seifer was almost scared to pursue the subject further.

Then again, he figured that he might never get another opportunity like this again.

"Really?" the blond finally asked softly. "Why not?"

"I don't know who my biological father is, so I never met his side of the family," the brunette continued in a gritty, distant tone, then paused. He seemed to be struggling for words, and Seifer didn't push him to go on. The blond knew well enough that Squall had difficulty expressing himself. Given time, he would eventually get it out, and from experience Seifer had learned that the worst thing he could do was to rush Squall in any shape or form. All he would ever accomplish by pressuring the dark haired boy into opening up was to cause Squall to pull even further away from him.

"My mom's parents... they..." Squall started, screwing up his face. He had started to twist his wristbands that stuck out beneath the sleeves of his jacket. Seifer recognized that sign of nervousness that was so typical for Squall, and he studied the brunette attentively, prepared to diffuse the gravity of the situation if needed. "I never met them, either. My mother left home when she was pregnant with me in high school. She never talked about it much, but... basically, her parents wanted her to get an abortion."

Seifer's eyebrows drew together. He remembered Squall's outburst at his apartment the night before... the boy's seemingly unfounded feelings of guilt over his mother's pregnancy with him. He hadn't expected the younger male to open up to him about it all so soon, but he was prepared to listen and try to understand whatever Squall was about reveal.

"I don't even really... _blame_ them, to be honest..." the dark haired teen went on, a sadness to his voice that that seemed much more profound than Squall would ever let on. He didn't even quite understand why he was telling Seifer all of these things, but the words were just coming out now, freed from the strict restraints that he normally had on his emotions. "She was a senior in high school, with her whole life and career laid out in front of her. She was a straight A student, a talented ballerina dancer, she had a scholarship to university... and she just... threw it all away."

"She didn't throw anything away," Seifer corrected him immediately, but he kept his inflection gentle. "She chose to bring you into this world, because you mattered more to her than any of that stuff. You're her son. Do you really think being a dancer would be more important to her than you? Squall... seriously, she made a decision that was only hers to make. She's your mother, and she chose to have you. Your grandparents had no control over it, and neither did you. Stop beating yourself up over it."

"They may not have had direct control over her, but their reluctance to support Mom's decision eventually caused her to leave," Squall growled bitterly, digging open old wounds that had never fully healed. "They told her she'd be kicked out of the house if she didn't abort the pregnancy... so she left, because of me, and she was all on her own. She was so young. My biological father wasn't there for her. He never even acknowledged the fact that I existed. My mother won't even tell me who the bastard is, because she's afraid I might go find him and kill him for what he's done. He wasn't there for her when she needed him. He's a pathetic excuse for a man. My mom did everything on her own. She had no one to help her. She was seventeen years old, with no place to go. It was... way too much responsibility."

"But she made it, right? Whatever she did, and regardless of what she went through, she still managed to raise you all on her own, and she did a damn fine job at it, too, might I add," the blond said encouragingly. He saw the darkness in Squall's eyes, and knew something was off, but he couldn't possibly say what it was. He smiled, hoping to lift Squall's spirits, but the brunette was ignoring him now, staring at the jungle gym, digging his fingers into his upper arms.

"Look," Seifer sighed, inching closer to Squall on the bench. He wanted to touch the brunette so badly, but he didn't figure that fondling Squall in front of a whole group of preschoolers and their parents was such a fantastic idea. Sometimes he wondered if that was all Squall really needed – someone to hold him, be there for him and make him feel safe, so he'd finally allow himself to be vulnerable. No seventeen year old human being could be this guarded and self-sufficient all the damn time. Squall would snap eventually if he'd keep all of his problems holed up inside. "You did nothing wrong, Squall. I can tell this is bothering you, but you have nothing to feel guilty about. Your mother _decided_ to raise you - nobody forced her to. I understand that it might have been rough on her at times, but ultimately, she managed. And now look at you! Here you are, seventeen years later, fine as frog's hair, and everything's alright. Your mom's married, you got a doll of a younger sister, and your family seems to be well taken care of. You shouldn't feel bad about anything!"

"... It's not that simple."

Squall stood up abruptly and walked over to the sandbox, where Ellone was still playing with her friends. Seifer watched him leaving, trying to understand the deeper meaning behind the brunette's words.

'_What in the world is going on here? Why does he feel so damn guilty about being born? How long has he been feeling this way, anyway? Doesn't he understand how completely pointless and unjustified it is? He's an intelligent guy. Why doesn't it go into his stubborn head that none of this is his fault__? There's got to be more to this story than he's letting on. Does he **really **have a happy family? He certainly doesn't act like it. And where is his real father at, anyway?'_

Seifer was still brooding when Ellone came running towards him, flailing her arms, squealing her pet name for him in delight. Almost out of instinct, Seifer jumped up and grabbed her around her tiny waist, swinging her through the air as he spun around on the spot, laughing away the darkness that was looming over him like a shadow. He didn't know that Squall was watching him from a few feet away, a quiet expression on his face as he wondered just how he was going to protect Seifer and Ellone from a man whose mind had an intimate understanding of the law, but whose heart had been rotted by crime and corruption a long time ago.

* * *

"... A right off Westwood Lane? Okay, I see it. - Yeah, I'm on Pinecrest Drive now. What's the house number again, 409? - 'Right, man. See you in a minute."

Seifer snapped his cell phone shut, looking around. He was driving his pick-up truck down a narrow, tree lined street into a small, beautiful rural neighborhood. His eyes were scanning the numbers on the houses that he was passing on his left and right hand side. There was a particular one that he was looking for: 409 Pinecrest Drive, home of one of his classmates, Irvine Kinneas. Finally, Seifer stopped in front of a large brick home with a colorfully landscaped front yard. He immediately recognized the bright red Mustang convertible parked in the driveway next to two other cars.

"Well, that's Irvine's ride... which makes this Irvine's _house_."

Satisfied, Seifer pulled his truck in behind Irvine's car and turned off his engine. It was early evening and he had just left Ward's Diner, where he had dropped off Squall and his sister so that the little girl could catch a ride home with her mother and the brunette could pick up his motorcycle. Squall had effectively fended off the blond's earnest attempts at inviting him out for dinner, which had ultimately left Seifer with too much free time on his hands and some interesting ideas on what he could do with it.

His afternoon at the park with Squall and Ellone had made Seifer think. He had realized how little he really knew about his dark haired friend, and how much unseen troubles Squall was hiding beneath the surface of a seemingly carefree life. Squall's past was too vague for Seifer to understand; the fragmented bits and pieces that Squall would share with him made very little sense. Therefore, Seifer had decided to dig deeper, to look beyond the surface of Squall's existence, and he would do it on his own, without the brunette knowing anything about his efforts. Of course, Seifer was mostly interested in the brunette's previous love life, and that guy named "Aren," whoever he might be.

'_Guess I'll find out here in a minute.'_

Seifer had decided to enlist Irvine as an informant, simply because he was one of his few people who knew Squall better than most. His talks with Selphie hadn't made much a difference so far, and he hoped that Irvine would prove to be a little bit more useful.

Yawning, he walked up to the front door of the Kinneas residence and rang the door bell. He was tuckered out from his adventures with Ellone and Squall at the playground. Honestly, Ell was a real blazing ball of energy. He had chased her all over the jungle gym and the sandbox, Squall right on his heels. They had rolled around in the sand like kids, playing with Ell and her little friends, unfazed by a set of parents nearby wondering aloud, "And whose children are _they_?". It had felt good to just goof off and be silly, especially when Squall had been right there with him, enjoying himself just as much.

'_That was a blast. I've never seen him laugh so much. Next time, I should bring Shiva. I think he'd like that.'_

Just as he had lifted his arms above his head and stretched heartily, the door in front of him opened and a petite woman with long, curly red hair appeared in front of him, looking him up and down with obvious curiosity.

"Well, hello," she said, grinning as he dropped his arms and assumed a more appropriate form, while looking at her with a dumbfounded expression on his handsome face. "You must be Seifer."

"Eh, yeah, sure am," Seifer replied with a wry smile. "Uh, nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you too," the redheaded woman chuckled, and her light blue eyes were sparking with humor. There was something mischievous about her that threw Seifer off a little. This woman didn't seem like a typical parent at all, despite the fact that she looked to be in her late thirties or early fourties. "I'm Tasha Kinneas, Irvine's mother. Well, don't just stand there, come on in, kiddo, make yourself at home."

"Thanks."

He stepped past her into a hallway with wooden floors and light colored walls that were lined with photographs and artsy trinkets of all sorts. The house looked warm and inviting, but it wasn't quite what Seifer had expected. Nothing about the house or the short, red haired woman in the jeans and simple white t-shirt suggested that her adolescent son was a freak case with a cowboy fetish.

'_Looks way normal to me. Not sure where Irvine is getting his crazy from, but it doesn't seem to be here.'_

Suddenly, another woman stepped around a corner further down the hallway. She had shoulder length, white-blonde hair that looked almost silver to Seifer's eyes. Her bangs obscured most of her face, which seemed strangely familiar. The woman's frame was short and slender, and she was dressed in a dark grey tank top and white jeans. When she tilted her head to give Seifer a look of plain curiosity out of dark, reddish brown eyes, something in the blond's mind finally clicked into place.

"Fujin?" he asked with a bewildered expression, before quickly correcting himself. "I mean, erh, miss Takahara. Sorry."

She watched him scratching his head in confusion, smiling just slightly, but giving no greeting or explanation of any kind. Just as he was trying to work out why on earth his weird art teacher was hanging out at Irvine's place, looking quite at home no less, the cowboy suddenly squeezed past her from the kitchen, only to walk up to him and give him a friendly smack on the head.

"Ey man, you found it!" the auburn haired cowboy declared contently, beaming at his classmate. He was wearing his trademark Stetson, typical tight Levi's jeans and a loose fitting black t-shirt. To Seifer's mild surprise, he was only wearing socks instead of his usual cowboy boots. All in all, he looked pretty laid back, but undeniably attractive nonetheless.

'_... If ever I decide to develop a penchant for cowboys, I know just where to go.'_

"So, anyway, that's my mom, Tasha," Irvine re-introduced the smiling redhead, before pointing at the silver haired woman, "And that's her wife, Fujin. She's a teacher at our school."

"We've met," the attractive silver haired female stated, seemingly unfazed by the fact that Seifer's head had just shot around to stare at her, both eyebrows raised to his hairline. The blond looked stunned and speechless for a second, and his slack jaw dropped just enough to make him look entirely retarded.

"Your mom's _wife_? You mean they're _lesbians_?" Seifer blurted out, all tact apparently forgotten. Irvine's mother was chuckling in amusement somewhere in the background, and Fujin looked entirely unimpressed.

"Yeah, they've been married for like, 10 years," Irvine explained with a bored shrug, as if it was the most unsurprising fact in the world.

Seifer merely nodded awkwardly, an estranged look on his face. "Right..."

Honestly, he was a little shocked. He knew that homosexual couples could tie the knot in Esthar, but that still didn't mean that gay marriages were all _that_ common of an occurrence.

He had never figured that Irvine's parents were _lesbians_!

'_With one of them being my teacher, no less. Wow. I had no idea. Uh, now what? This is awkward. I feel like I just stuck my head way up my own ass.'_

Scratching his forehead in a gesture of discomfort, he looked at Irvine for guidance, who finally pointed towards a set of stairs.

"Well, let's go upstairs to my pad, man," the cowboy declared, already proceeding towards the staircase. "We can look for those yearbooks you wanted to see."

"Oh, uh... right, yeah," Seifer answered hastily, hurrying after the other male. For some reason, the thought of staying behind with the two smirking women scared him just a little. He could hear them giggling among each other as him and Irvine were making their way up the stairs, with the cowboy whistling some random, cheery tune.

"So... uh... yeah, uh..." Seifer started, stumbling over the words. He had never quite felt so tongue-tied before.

"Yeah, my mom's a dyke," Irvine stated quite bluntly, performing a 'so-what' gesture with his right hand. He was smiling, and he seemed completely unmoved by Seifer's awkward behavior. "I've been around women pretty much all of my life."

Seifer couldn't help but let out a small snort.

"Well," the blond said, producing a sarcastic sneer. "That explains a few things."

"Like what? The fact that I'm such a ladies' man?" the cowboy assumed proudly, drumming his fist against the right side of his chest. "Yeah, I've heard that one before. Chicks dig me 'cause I'm in touch with my feminine side."

"Yeah, aren't you ever," Seifer laughed, earning himself a jab in the side from Irvine.

"Up yours, jerk off," the other male warned, but he was grinning good-naturedly. He had walked Seifer through a hallway across the second floor and straight into his own bedroom. It was a large, inviting looking room with a queen size bed, a TV set up, a computer desk, a few video game consoles and a guitar that was laid out on Irvine's coffee table. Random things were strung here and there across the carpet, and Seifer noticed a large pile of dirty laundry in a far corner. The blond felt immediately at home; a feeling that, quite truthfully, he hadn't experienced when he had walked into Squall's room for the first time.

'_Hell, Squall's room is about as cozy as a fuckin' morgue!'_

"Make your happy ass at home," Irvine told him as he plopped down on one of the two couches and grabbed the controller for one of his video games that was still running on his TV. Absentmindedly, he pointed at a nearby bookcase and said, "Oh yeah, if you wanna look at those yearbooks, they're over there on one of the shelves."

"Right on."

Seifer acknowledged the information with a nod and proceeded towards Irvine's bookcase. Earlier today, he had found himself enlightened with the brilliant idea of going through Irvine's old high school yearbooks (his freshman one, to be precise) to hopefully find a trace of Squall's elusive former lover, Aren Collins.

"So," Seifer started as he picked a couple of books from the shelves. Looking at the dates imprinted on the book sleeves, he figured that these had to be from Irvine's freshman and sophomore year. "You ever know a guy named Aren? Aren Collins?"

"Aren?" the cowboy questioned, still playing his video game. It was a first person shooter as far as Seifer could tell from a distance, and the music to it was playing somewhere in the background, coming from Irvine's surround sound system. "Nah, man, don't think I've ever heard the name before, sorry."

"Really? You sure?" the blond asked again, sounding skeptic. He had furrowed his forehead into a frown.

"Yup." Irvine replied absently.

"Well, fuck me running," Seifer growled, moving towards the couch across from Irvine while dragging his feet.

"Yeah, I'll get right on that," Irvine quipped with a playful grin. Seifer merely gave him a sour look.

"Hey, why you askin', anyway?" the cowboy finally inquired, more engaged in the conversation this time. His face had turned halfway to meet Seifer's. When he noticed the solemn glare in the other male's eyes, he finally paused his game and tossed his controller aside to give his friend his immediate and undivided attention. "Okay, seriously dude, what's the deal? Who's that guy supposed to be? You're up to something."

"It's someone Squall used to know," Seifer replied vaguely as he sank into the seat cushions, cradling the two yearbooks in his lap. He glanced over them hesitantly, not sure if he would like what he'd find once he opened them.

"Oh, _Squall _you say, huh?" Irvine sang, a sudden peak of curiosity to his voice that hadn't been there before. His amethyst eyes were glittering with unconcealed interest. "Say, that kinda reminds me... What's the deal with you two lovebirds, anyhow?"

"_Lovebirds_?" Seifer shot back instinctively, sounding more defensive than he had intended to. "No clue what you're talkin' about."

"Dude, I was raised by two lesbians," Irvine stated matter-of-factly, crossing his legs and throwing them up on the coffee table in front of him. "You don't have to bullshit me, okay. I pretty much know gayness when I see it."

For a moment, Seifer seriously considered slugging Irvine right then and there, if only for his smart mouth. Then, he thought better of it. Yeah, the cowboy could be a downright pain in the ass and all, but aside from Selphie, he was the only person Seifer had ever met that seemed completely unbothered by the concept of him having the hots for his _male_ classmate.

Honestly, he wasn't quite used to this much approval of his sexual orientation. This was starting to feel just a little bizarre.

Meanwhile, Irvine was surveying him from beneath the wide brim of his cowboy hat, which he casually pushed up with his thumb.

"So?" the auburn haired teen asked. "Am I right, or am I right?"

"Kiss my rosy ass, Kinneas," Seifer taunted, flipping the other male off. "So what if you're right, dingleberry?"

"So you two are all gay for each other," Irvine shrugged lazily, looking entirely unimpressed. "Hey, that's cool."

"I'm not sure he's all _that_ gay for me, but thanks for the approval and all," the blond grunted, now planting his feet on the table as well.

"What, are you two fighting over who's gonna be the pitcher and who's gonna be the receiver, or what's the deal here?" the cowboy joked. "You two could always flip a coin, ya know."

"That's not really the issue, although I hadn't thought quite _that_ far ahead," Seifer replied indistinctly.

'_What's there to think about, anyway? I've always been on top. It's what I do. I'm pretty fuckin' good at it, too, if I do say so myself, and I sure as hell love doin' it. Granted, Squall's got more balls than all the guys I've ever fucked before, but someone's gotta be the bottom here, and it ain't gonna be me, I tell you that. As long as he lets me fuck him just once, he'll never want anything else, anyway.' _

"You are a piss poor liar, my friend," Irvine laughed. "You pictured his ass naked the first time you saw him!"

"So I'm just as horny as the next guy," Seifer shrugged, a wide grin on his face. He was grateful that Irvine had interrupted his thought process, because he had already felt a hard-on coming on. "Sue me, Kinneas."

"Well, he ain't a bad lookin' guy, I guess," the other male admitted in a contemplative tone. "Not the most charming thing out there by any means, but... ya know. If I was gay, I guess I'd be tailing his ass, too. Alas, I prefer the fairer sex, so you're in luck. That ass is all yours, man. Have at it."

"Gee, thanks," the blond snorted sarcastically, before his face abruptly grew stern. "Hey, seriously, though... did you know that Squall was gay before I came along?"

"Eh, let's say I had my suspicions," Irvine informed him with a half-shrug and a wave of his hand. "A guy who's _that_ good looking but never had a girlfriend kind of raises questions about his sexuality. Then again, he's got _lousy_ damn people skills, so I figured maybe he's been wanting to go out with girls but just doesn't know how to go about it. Rinoa was after him for the longest time, but he always just kind of ignored her. Not that I blame him or anything... that girl's been around."

"I see," Seifer said thoughtfully, the significance of Irvine's statement lost on him for right now. His eyes were drifting around the room as he pondered the cowboy's words. Finally, he slanted his head to the side and gave Irvine a look of uncertainty. "I take it that means you've never seen him date a guy before?"

"_Hell_ no!" Irvine chortled. "You know, I don't think the guy so much as dates his _right hand_, if you know what I mean. Completely clueless, I swear."

"You ain't kidding."

"Then again, maybe you know something I don't," Irvine suggested sneakily. He waggled his eyebrows at Seifer, but the blond snorted in reply.

"Like hell," Seifer grunted under his breath. "He threatens to neuter me every time I come near him."

"Ouch," the cowboy winced. "No love lost there, I see."

"Oh, he wants me, he just hasn't given it up yet," the blond insisted stubbornly, trying to keep his male pride from being compromised. "Trust me, I'll pop his cherry and put some whipped cream on top, too."

"Yeah, sure, you hang on real tight to that thought, my friend," Irvine chuckled, grinning from ear to ear. "Meanwhile, I'll look into reconstructive surgery for ball sacks for you."

"Fuck you, Kinneas," Seifer shot back, swiftly flipping the other male off for the second time that afternoon. The cowboy, however, was roaring with laughter at his offended expression. He honestly seemed to enjoy the imagery of his blond friend becoming a eunuch at Squall Leonhart's hands.

Seifer watched him cracking up, his hands twitching with the urge to pummel Irvine off the couch for being such a pest. Finally, he resigned himself to the fact that Irvine wasn't going to stop acting like a retard anytime soon, and he spared the cowboy with a lopsided grin that radiated pity. "You really are a fuckin' dingleberry, you know."

"Man, I almost pissed myself there for a minute," Irvine prompted, still chortling and wiping tears of laughter from his eyes. Finally, after several moments, he managed to compose himself just enough to regard Seifer with a half-smirk and a thumbs up. "Seriously, dude: good luck with the ice princess – you're gonna need it."

Seifer rolled his eyes in a gesture of annoyance, but said nothing. He demonstratively begun to flip through Irvine's freshman yearbook, proceeding immediately to the senior class section. Even after minutes of browsing the pages, however, he couldn't find anyone by the name of Aren.

"What the hell..."

He frowned, staring at the glossy paper in front of him. He had looked at all the photos, all the names, and found nothing.

'_There's no one by that name in this yearbook, and Irvine never even heard of the guy. What's going on here? Did he lie to me about the guy's name so I wouldn't find him if I looked for him? What the __**fuck**__.'_

With a few harsh hand movements, Seifer flipped to the section of the Deling City High freshman class, irritation written on his face as he glowered at the pages. It didn't take him long to locate Squall's class picture, and for some reason, Seifer's anger dissipated as soon as he laid eyes on it.

The brunette looked as striking as he always had, but Seifer hadn't expected much else. Squall's hair was slightly shorter in the photograph than it was today. His skin looked tanned, with a healthy flush glowing on his cheeks, and there was a certain intensity and brightness about his face that Seifer only rarely saw on Squall these days. He had a small, almost impish smile on his lips and the fearless curiosity of a thirteen or fourteen year old in his eyes. He looked to be as carefree of a kid as any.

Apprehensively, Seifer placed the hardcover bound pages next to him on the couch and opened Irvine's sophomore yearbook instead. When he finally found Squall's picture situated between that of a Jennifer Lennon and a guy named Charles Lewis, Seifer's face froze as the significance of the photograph hit him like a ton of bricks.

'_... Something happened to him, three years ago. Something that turned him from a happy, normal kid into a completely dysfunctional teenager. Something that makes him want to cut his wrists and stay as far away from everyone as he possibly can.'_

Narrowing his eyes, Seifer continued to stare at the picture of an absurdly handsome, yet entirely emotionless looking brunette boy. Squall's face had a flat affect, and he looked paler and skinnier than he had in the picture from only a year prior. His light, grey blue eyes were lacking luster. There was a dullness there that Seifer found nothing short of alarming.

'_What in the world happened to him?'_

He had asked Squall that question before, but the brunette's explanation no longer seemed satisfactory. Squall's alleged ex-boyfriend, Aren, was nowhere to be found in the records of Squall's freshman year, and Seifer suddenly began to wonder whether the faceless male even existed at all. He had never questioned Squall's word, but something here wasn't the way it was supposed to be.

"... What's wrong?"

Seifer looked up, swiping Irvine, who was still sitting on the couch across from him, a sideways glance. The cowboy was reciprocating his look with a certain suspicion and a touch of concern. Obviously, he was waiting on an answer.

"How well do you know Squall, anyway?" Seifer asked slowly, aligning theories and questions inside his mind. They formed a complex pattern, with no tangible solution in sight that even remotely appealed to the blond.

In all truth, he wasn't quite sure _how _he was going to get to the bottom of this.

"I'm not sure, to be honest with you," Irvine replied evenly. He leaned back in his seat, scratching his nose as he reflected on the past. Obviously, it was something that he hadn't done in a while. "I used to think that I knew him pretty well. I mean, I actually considered him a friend for a few years."

"Well, what happened?" Seifer asked impatiently.

"Couldn't tell you," Irvine admitted dumbly, raising his shoulders. "I've known him since kindergarten. Then him and his mother moved to Esthar for a while, when we were in elementary school. That's where his mom met Squall's stepfather, as far as I know. They moved back here together and Squall started high school at the same time as I did."

"What was he like during his Freshman year?"

The auburn haired youth seemed to ponder that question. "I think he was just like he used to be as a kid," he said. "We were still friends. I remember, cause he defended me in front of some idiots from Junior class who had gotten wind of my mother being a lesbian and all that. Him and I really whooped those guys' asses! He decked one of them with just one punch, I totally remember. It was pretty badass."

Seifer smiled faintly at the thought of Squall and Irvine beating the crap out of some older high school kids. His gaze flitted to the picture of Squall in Freshman class; that bright, cheeky looking kid with a healthy tan and a dusting of freckles on his nose, whose only concern in the world seemed to be what his mother would cook him for dinner or if his favorite cartoon was running on TV when he came home from school.

'_He looks like he has absolutely everything going for him. There doesn't seem to be a thing wrong with him at all.'_

"Then... things kind of changed," Irvine continued hesitantly, pressing his lips together.

"What changed?" Seifer questioned, his interest stimulated once more.

"_He_ did," the cowboy explained, animatedly waving his hands through the air, obviously referring to Squall. "I swear, for the longest time, I thought that it was me. I thought that I had pissed him off or something, because he stopped talking to me and hanging out with me. Then I kind of figured out that he just wasn't the same guy he used to be. He didn't want to be around _anyone_. It wasn't just me. He became completely introverted and started acting like the most gigantic asshole towards anyone who tried to be nice to him. Eventually, I just gave up and let him do his own thing. I thought that maybe it would get better over time, but overall, it really only got worse."

"When did all of that happen?" Seifer asked, furrowing his brows.

"I guess sometime during Freshman year," the cowboy responded. "I think something happened when his family went on Christmas vacation to the Trabia mountains that year. I heard some rumors, something about him and his sister getting into an accident, but nobody ever really figured out what happened. Squall doesn't talk about it, and I don't think the rest of his family does, either."

"Did you ever look in the newspaper or anything?" the blond suggested hopefully.

"I did," Irvine said, shaking his head. "Nada. It's like this big, fucking mystery."

"Well, shit," Seifer grunted, blowing out a breath.

"You could ask him about it, but I don't really recommend it," the other youth offered, tipping back his cowboy hat to scratch his forehead. "I tried, because I thought that's what friends should do, ya know, be there for each other, but he kind of blew up in my face and pretty much refused to speak with me for the rest of the year. Even since then we don't exchange much more than a quick sentence here and there."

"Yeah, I noticed you guys weren't exactly getting your bro-mance on," Seifer said with a low chuckle, covering up the fact that he was actually quite unsettled by the things he had discovered this afternoon.

"I really don't know what his deal is," Irvine finally concluded, resignation to his tone. "I think something pretty significant must have happened for him to do a complete one-eighty like that on everyone, but I don't know what. Maybe you can figure it out."

And that was all that Irvine said, gazing at the blond with a look that was a mix of skepticism and pity. Seifer, however, snapped the yearbook shut, determination blazing in his eyes that wouldn't be extinguished before he'd have finally unraveled the truth about Squall and the clouded mystery of his fucked up past.

"You bet your ass I will."

* * *

'_How long does it take for a person to drown? How many minutes? How many breaths? And why couldn't we drown ourselves on purpose, even if we wanted to?'_

He was floating on his back, in the warm water of his parents' heated indoor pool. His eyes were staring at the ceiling, and he was listening to the fading notes of a piece of classical music playing from a CD somewhere in the background. Anyone watching him would have found the sight of a half-dressed brunette teenager floating in the middle of a lavishly tiled granite pool entirely bizarre. Squall couldn't have possibly cared less. He had found a perfect balance between his body and the water, keeping himself from going under without so much as moving a single limb.

Squall went to the pool quite often, swimming for hours until the tape around his wrists became so soggy that it nearly dissolved and his muscles had tired to a point where he could hardly even stand. He didn't do it for the sake of getting a work-out or sculpting his body; he did it because it was one of the few things in life that still brought him a fraction of enjoyment.

Tonight, however, he didn't feel like doing laps. He had simply made his way here after his mother and Ellone had left to visit with another family and have dinner with them. He hadn't bothered to take off his washed out blue jeans and white t-shirt. Instead, he had immersed himself almost completely dressed, struggling with the forces of the water until he had finally achieved a state of complete equilibrium.

His skin was glistening in the dim, artificial light cast by numerous lamps inlet into the ceiling. Other than that, it was perfectly dark and quiet in this part of the house. Squall could hear the echo of his own heartbeat in the water. His eyes were red around the iris; they stung, and they were constantly watering in an attempt to wash out the chlorine, but it didn't bother him enough to get out.

He just wanted to lie there, cradled by the subtle waves created from the pool's powerful jet system, thinking about everything and yet nothing at all.

'_We're born with this strong instinct to survive. Even as babies, our bodies fight with everything we have to stay alive. We may know nothing of the world we're brought into, but we do know that we don't want to leave it. Why is that? Why are we born with such a strong will to survive, and yet no mechanism that will control how much we hurt the people around us? Are we just brought into this world to be selfish?'_

He sighed, feeling his breath like a cloud of cool, heavy mist against his wet skin. It was completely silent around him; apparently, the CD had stopped playing a while ago. His mind felt like lead, and he wished that he could simply fall asleep like this, floating in the water.

'_I must've been in here for over an hour now...'_

When he suddenly realized how cold he had become due to his lack of movement, his body started to tremble. He had been laying motionless in the tepid pool for too long, surrounded by an element that had gradually been draining all of his warmth. His muscles were almost stiff. He let out a soft groan and swirled his arms around himself, trying to create heat through motion.

'_It's so cold. But I don't wanna get out yet...'_

"What in the world are you doing?"

He started, and that break in his concentration alone caused him to lose his sense of balance and go underwater. Quickly, he pushed himself upwards, coughing up gulps of water that had entered his lungs. He placed his feet on the ground of the pool, his head and shoulders barely peeking through the surface of the water. Rubbing his eyes to ease the increased sting of the chlorine as he continued to cough, he looked towards the edge of the pool.

Kato was lingering by a pile of towels that Squall had left at the head end of the pool basin. The dark haired man was still wearing the pants of a black, tailor made suit, a dark grey dress shirt and a red tie around his neck that he had loosened just slightly; apparently, he had only just returned home from work.

Squall swallowed, but he couldn't get rid of the lump that he suddenly felt in his throat.

"Why are you in the pool with your clothes on?" the man asked, no particular emotion to his voice. Squall noted curiosity, at best, reprimand, at worst.

The boy released a breath of air he had unconsciously been holding.

"... No reason," he said, sounding indefinite.

He avoided the man's eyes and glared instead at the rippling surface of the water in front of him. His body was still shaking.

"You really are an odd kid," Kato stated evenly, watching Squall's blank face from afar. He was soaking wet from head to toe, but he looked so beautiful with every strand of hair and every fiber of clothing clinging to his perfectly shaped body. His skin was pale, and his lips were tinged a fascinating shade of blue. He couldn't seem to stop shivering.

Kato let out a sharp sigh.

"You look like you're freezing," he remarked brusquely, half turning on his heel. "Get out."

Squall swiped the man an upwards glance that was tentative and full of long nurtured, skittish suspicion. Kato had bent down to pick up one of his towels, and he was holding it in his hand in a pretense act of kindness, gazing upon his stepson expectantly.

Squall hadn't moved an inch from his spot.

"That wasn't a request, Squall. Don't make me tell you again," Kato warned, his inflection as soft as the purr of a carnivore.

"... I want to stay a while longer," the boy gave a quiet reply, avoiding eye contact with the other male once more. He knew that Kato's temper was volatile and far too easily inflamed. The only reason Squall chose to disobey his stepfather this time was because he was frightened by the idea of getting out of the pool in Kato's presence. He was soaked and his clothes stuck to his body, outlining every curve of bone and muscle that he could call his own. He had noticed that dark glint of desire in Kato's eyes when the man had looked him up and down, and he knew precisely what it meant.

"You do what I tell you to. I'm _done_ playing games with you, Squall," the man bit back icily, and the brunette saw him dropping the towel to the floor. "You won't disrespect me again like you did last night."

"I'm not the one playing games here," Squall whispered, his voice brittle as he pressed the words through teeth he had clenched too hard to chatter. He had opened his mouth before thinking, and as soon as he realized what he had said, he knew that he had just made a very stupid mistake.

He flinched when Kato suddenly leaped into the pool, completely dressed, wading towards him so rapidly that the abrupt flurry of motions sent all of Squall's flight instincts into overdrive. Just as he had veered around in a futile attempt to get out of the water, he felt Kato's hand closing around the nape of his neck, yanking him back.

Squall lost his tread on the bottom of the swimming pool and his head went underwater once more. He could feel Kato pulling him towards the edge of the pool, but Squall only offered half-hearted resistance. He was too taken aback to do much more than flail his arms and legs pathetically. His pulse was racing as he started to panic, and he choked on the water in his airway. Frantically, he tried to catch his breath, but he kept losing his balance as Kato was dragging him along.

"You think you're really clever, don't you?" Squall heard the man barking as he shoved him up against the wall of the pool, somewhere where the water only came up to their waists. The impact knocked the wind out of the brunette, and he found himself struggling for air once more.

"S-_shit_," the dark haired boy gasped against the burning in his throat, his features contorted as he tried to regain his balance. He spun sideways hastily to face his adversary, who had released his grasp on Squall's neck.

The man was staring at him, his grey eyes hard and blanched of any trace of paternal kindness. Squall was reciprocating his stepfather's cold gaze with apprehension, holding one arm against his side where his ribs had made painful contact with the edge of the pool basin.

"You are a dumb little shit for thinking you can back-talk me, Squall," Kato finally snarled, grabbing a firm hold of Squall's left upper arm. The brunette instinctively jerked back and his eyes cut to the side as if he was expecting to be hit, but he remained perfectly silent. He had suddenly lost all intention to argue with the man.

"It's been three years and you haven't learned a goddamn thing. Have you heard _one_ thing that I've said?" the older male asked roughly, pulling his stepson closer. Squall could feel him breathing down his neck, and he couldn't help but shiver in response. Kato noticed him shaking; he was surveying every inch of Squall's body, appreciating the brunette's exquisite looks that seemed only enhanced by his fright.

"What do you want me to say?" Squall finally asked, the words coming out weak and breathless. He was staring at some point past Kato's head, trying to ignore the nausea welling up inside him. He couldn't take being so physically close to the man.

"Just keep your mouth _shut_," Kato suggested with a soft sneer. His eyes were still roving over Squall's body. He took one step around the brunette, moving towards his back with the grace of a predator. Then, he bent his head down just slightly to bring his mouth close to Squall's left ear.

"But... if you insist on playing games, Squall, then trust me, I have no problems playing with you all night long," he whispered, ghosting the lobe of Squall's ear with his lower lip. The brunette jumped at the sudden contact, but Kato was still clasping his arm tightly with one hand.

"No!" Squall winced, a strangled plea to his voice that hadn't been there before. His body shook more violently now as a primal, deeply rooted terror settled in.

"You know, I've been wondering about something," Kato continued, smiling eerily, savoring the fact that Squall's eyes went wide in fear. "If you weren't this fucking pretty, would anyone but me still be interested in you? Maybe we should find out, you and I. Boy, I could ruin your looks forever and it would never even look like anything more than an unfortunate accident. I hardly think that football player crush of yours would wanna touch you with a barge pole after I'm finished with you. God, Squall, you have no idea how much I want to fuck you up right now."

Squall swallowed, biting back tears. Despair was sinking into every crevice of his soul; he felt so completely and utterly helpless. For just a brief, seemingly insignificant flicker of a moment, he felt himself longing for Seifer to come and put an end to this fucked up nightmare that was an everyday part of his life. It was an absurd fantasy, and he felt ridiculous for even thinking about it. After all, what would have been the point? The image of a knight in shining armor coming to his rescue seemed entirely wasted on him.

The moment where he could still be saved had passed a long time ago. There was no going back, and there would be no happy ending. At this point, the only question that remained was just how many scars he would take to his grave.

'_No...'_

Squall took a breath and held it, reaching for that small spark of hope inside of him that trauma had not touched. He wasn't going to surrender himself to some fate that the monster named Kato had sketched out for him. For now, he would cooperate, but some day his mother and sister would be save from the man's threats, and Squall would be save from his desecrating hands. He could do this, all by his seventeen year old self. He had no illusions about recovering from the pain and suffering that Kato had put him through, but this had never been about his own well-being. The only reason he was still here was because he knew that he could put an end to that bastard's control over his own and his family's life.

It was only a matter of time.

Acquiescence fell over his face, and Squall slowly closed his eyes, drowning out the man's presence and the touch of his hands, which had begun to roam his body eagerly. There was more strength inside him than Kato would ever manage to destroy.

With newfound calm that was entirely foreign for someone his age, Squall said, "Do whatever you want. I don't care."

The man paused, staring at his stepson from behind. This wasn't the response that Kato had expected, nor was it the one he had hoped for. It wasn't like Squall to surrender to his advances without at least a bit of a token struggle. That, in fact, was one of the reasons why Kato enjoyed himself so much.

Then again, he wasn't quite so easily fooled.

"Right," he said with a cynical, self-content sneer as his left hand closed around Squall's windpipe from behind and he unbuttoned the brunette's jeans with the other, laughing ever so softly. "Because I was going to ask your permission."

Squall tensed, but remained in place even as Kato's hand slid over his hipbone and eased his pants halfway down the shallow curve of his butt. He swallowed against the pressure that the man exerted on his throat and cocked his head back to breathe more easily. He could feel Kato nipping at the skin on his neck, right near the slope of his left shoulder, and Squall's face twisted in response. His eyes stung with tears, but he refused to put up a fight, unwilling to grant that man any gratuitous bits of satisfaction for tonight. Instead, he persuaded himself to stay motionless and endure the fact that his world was burning all around him.

"You must really be enjoying this," Kato taunted, pushing his hand into the back of Squall's pants, attempting to elicit a response. As he savored every inch of the brunette's cold, wet skin, Squall shifted and jerked his head to the side, trying to scatter the thoughts in his mind that seemed to orbit only around escaping from the horrible things that were being done to him.

'_I hate him. I hate him __**so**__... __**much**__...'_

He tried to turn completely inward, ignoring his stepfather's hands on his body. He had years of practice at this, but he still couldn't manage to block Kato's touch out completely. For a moment in which his mind seemed to wander into less traumatizing territories, he wondered, with almost childish innocence, how other people could possibly enjoy sexual intercourse – how anything this terrifying could ever feel good. The act itself was physically painful, even without the sickening emotional twist that Kato managed to add to it. Sometimes, Squall asked himself whether Kato was still sleeping with his mother, and whether he brought her any pleasure at all, but the thought itself almost caused the brunette to vomit.

The only good thing that had ever come from any of Kato's sexual advances was Squall's younger sister, Ellone.

'_I can't believe that someone who is this fucking disgusting could manage to produce something so absolutely beautiful. She is perfect. I would never let him touch her.'_

He let out a shaky breath, now absorbing the feeling of Kato's fingers gliding over his skin, lingering here and there, moving only to catch Squall off guard. There was no urgency driving Kato's movements, only perverse, playful patience.

'_Why can't he just get it over with...?'_

His fear felt like a stone in the pit of his stomach. He didn't know what Kato was waiting on, and that uncertainty caused Squall's panic to flare at last. He tried to collect his thoughts and think of anything _but_ the man's hands on his body, but it wasn't working. He couldn't decide what was worse: the actual feeling of Kato raping him, or the knowledge that it was about to happen and that he could do absolutely nothing to stop him.

Suddenly, Kato's hand tightened around his throat, causing Squall to gag against the painful obstruction of his airway. He shifted and pushed his chin back, fighting for a breath. His hands reached backwards, attempting to push Kato away, but his efforts were to no avail.

"You've been fucking him, haven't you?" Kato hissed in a low, semi-growling tone that was spiked with hatred, which immediately caused Squall's struggles to still. "I bet he's been doing you all this time. That dumb little pisser of a football player."

"N-no," Squall pressed in a fragile, flattened tone of voice that was cracking due to the pressure Kato was exerting on his vocal chords. "I told... you... I haven't... ugh..."

"If you're lying to me," the man whispered now, pressing his mouth to Squall's ear, "I will break every bone in your two-faced little body. I will _fuck _you up until that cunt of yours will cry at the mere sight of you. And I won't stop with you, Squally boy. Rest assured of that."

With that, Kato pushed Squall away from him, never giving the boy a chance to work out just who the 'cunt' was that he had referred to. For some reason, the image of his mother shot into Squall's mind, and his stomach dropped. Kato was filled with a carnal viciousness and spite; even if there was one grain of goodness left in him, Squall was sure he'd never see it. How was he possibly going to keep his loved ones safe from a man who had no restraints on his own temper? Kato had no sense of morals, and the term 'boundaries' meant nothing to him at all.

He was completely insane.

Gasping for air, the brunette stood facing the edge of the pool, his eyelids fluttering as he was breathing rapidly in and out. He was waiting for the man to put his hands on him once more, every muscle of his body freezing up in anticipation.

The expected assault, however, never came to pass.

Squall heard movement in the water, and eventually, the sound of Kato climbing out of the pool and exiting the hall. The brunette didn't dare to turn his head. He simply remained standing stock still, feeling the water moving evenly around him... wondering just why Kato had spared him tonight.

'_He has never... done this before.'_

He shuddered, taking a deep breath against the tightness in his chest. Then, something inside of him seemed to dislodge. It was as if all of his walls came crashing down around him, burying him under weeks and months and _years_ of abuse that he thought he could handle, but that had broken him a long time ago.

He collapsed against the edge of the pool, laying his head down in the crook of his elbow, crying like a child with his pants still halfway down his legs. Overwhelmed by fear, anger, relief, loneliness, pain and pure, heart-wrenching despair, he couldn't stop sobbing, even as his body was going into spasms and his knees nearly gave in on him. Every time he thought that he couldn't possibly hurt any more than he already did, Kato always managed to add yet another little nuance of abhorrence to his life.

As if Squall didn't already have enough things to be afraid of.

'_I didn't lie... I never... Seifer and I never slept with each other... Kato can say nothing... __**nothing**__... I've done nothing wrong! Shit... ugh... Does he even know about the ball yet? He can't... I'm sure he would've said something... It's just a dance, he can't possibly think it has anything to do with sex... he __**can't**__... ugh...'_

He didn't even know who he was defending himself to, or why he even saw the need to bother. No answer of his, no matter how truthful or right, would ever be anything but wrong to Kato's ears. Deep down, Squall was painfully aware of this, but for right now, he wanted to cling on to some pathetic concept of hope. His voice was thick and coated as he cried on, muttering senseless pleas and justifications against his own skin. Darkness was pouring in all around him. He looked for the world like a small, scared and disheveled human being that had grown up too fast and lost a kind of innocence that he would never be able to reclaim.

Still, there was a stubbornness and pride to him that would one day likely cost him his life.

Squall hadn't learned that his psyche could only take so much abuse before it cracked. Somehow, he still figured that he could cope, even through all the tears and all the vile memories collecting in the corners of his mind.

He didn't know that all of his coping mechanisms had failed from the first moment he had ever employed them, even many years before Kato had ever entered his life. He mistook his own strength for invulnerability, holding the firm belief that he needed no proper father figure, no protection from harm and no healthy outlet for the dark, shapeless emotions that always seemed to find their way through his veins into the cuts inflicted upon his own wrists. He had carefully constructed a spectacular scaffolding of lies and excuses that were intended to fool him just as much as anyone else, not knowing that everything would collapse on top of him at last.

It had only just begun.


	26. Blood Ritual

-:-  
**Chapter 26  
****Blood Ritual**

"_You're better than that."  
_-:-

He was nervous today, not really knowing why. There was a certain childish giddiness and clumsiness to his antics; honestly, he felt like a complete idiot.

Even worse, an idiot who was in love.

Seifer hadn't seen much of Squall this week, or at least he hadn't seen nearly enough to satisfy him. It had been four days since their afternoon at the park – four days since he had spent any quality time with Squall that was worth mentioning. Granted, they had passed gym class, art class and math class in each other's company, but there had been no real intimacy there, only an awkward relationship in the rough that probably looked to most like a budding friendship.

And perhaps it was just that.

Seifer enjoyed Squall's presence for more complex reasons than just his smoking good looks. The crabby little bastard had a brilliant, sarcastic sense of humor, and wits that were sharp enough to nail Seifer to the next best tree at any given time. Aside from his constant mood swings and intermittent threats of turning Seifer into a woman once and for all, the brunette was actually fun to be around. He made every class, no matter how boring, pass by too quickly, and any one of those rare smiles of his was worth a hundred death glares.

Therefore, Seifer was rightfully excited to be meeting Squall for a late lunch at Ward's on this quiet, wind chilled Thursday afternoon – just one day before their anticipated date for the school's Homecoming dance.

Honestly, part of the blond was still expecting Squall to bail on him and find some kind of excuse to not go to the ball after all. The brunette didn't seem like the type to stand people up once he had given his word, but at the same time, Squall had been acting more skittish than usual. Seifer figured that the brunette's change in behavior could at least be partly blamed on their date. He hadn't told the brunette about his talk with Irvine yet; Squall had no idea that the cowboy knew about their relationship, nor that Seifer had secretly been snooping around in his past. So far, the blond had thought it wiser not to bring the subject up just yet.

"Heeey, blondie, what are _you_ doing here, all by yourself?" a familiar female voice suddenly chirped by his side, and Seifer looked up from the menu he had been studying with half-hearted interest.

A short, dark blonde girl was cockily leaning up against his table, carefully balancing a tray with dirty dishes in one hand, and she was no stranger to him.

"Why, I came to see you, of course," he lilted with a charming grin, which only caused her to stick her tongue out at him.

"Haha, good one," the teenage girl named Selphie laughed sarcastically, smacking him lightly against the side of his head with her free hand. "I know better than that."

He shrugged apologetically and smoothed back his wheat blond hair. Carefully, he sized her up out of sharp, emerald green eyes, and he found that she looked quite attractive in her dark blue waitress uniform, with her make-up done tastefully and her hair styled to perfection, as usual. Her face radiated spunk and attitude, without making her appear even one bit arrogant. Somehow, she managed to pull off being aggravating and lovable at the same time.

For a moment, Seifer wondered whether Irvine even realized what a catch this girl truly was.

"You're waiting on Squall, I take it?" she assumed in a thoughtful tone of voice, tapping the coaster on his table with her index finger, which caused it to spin in place.

"Yeah," Seifer nodded, taking a glimpse at his wristwatch. "He should be here any minute."

"Oh, good. I was wondering what he was up to. Well... say, uh, how have you guys been getting along, anyway?" Selphie asked, carefully keeping the level of curiosity in her inflection to a minimum.

"Better, I guess," Seifer said, unwilling to divulge too much information in public. "We hung out some over the weekend. We took his sister to the park and stuff. It was fun."

"Great!" she exclaimed with a smile, and her face lit up with something he would have probably catalogued as relief. "So, you're still on for the dance tomorrow, right?"

"Sure. What about you?"

"Oh yeah, totally," she affirmed, nodding her head. "Irvine said he'd pick me up around 8pm tomorrow. You know, I've never been to a dance at your school before."

"That makes two of us," Seifer chuckled.

"I'm pretty sure Squally's never been to one, either," the girl contemplated, scratching her temple. "So I guess Irvine will be the only one of us who's got any real experience with this."

"Ain't that a shocker," the blond snorted, leaning back in his bench lazily. "Irvine's such a social fuckin' little butterfly."

"Yeah... He told me he wants to be elected Prom King this year," Selphie sighed, shaking her head and rolling her eyes in exasperation. "He sounded all kinds of determined about it, too."

"Only over my dead body," Seifer scoffed. "I was gunning for that position myself. I'm _always _Prom King, just so you know."

"Oh, really. 'Always', huh? How many proms have you been to?" she chortled, the sarcasm in her voice anything but subtle.

"This will be my seventh one," the blond declared proudly, smirking when she raised her eyebrows at him. "Hey, what can I say – I was pretty popular back home."

"You slut," she teased. "And who's gonna be your lovely Prom Queen?"

"Squall's gonna be my Prom Queen, of course," Seifer said smugly.

"I'd rather stab myself in the eye with a rusty nail," came a snide growl just past Selphie's slender frame, effectively ruining the blond male's teenage fantasy just like so.

Surprised, Seifer straightened up in his seat and found Squall walking up to his table. The restaurant was buzzing around him; Seifer hadn't even really noticed how busy it was. The brunette looked irritable, yet enticing as always in dark brown boots, fitted indigo blue jeans, a tight, grey long sleeve thermal shirt and a black t-shirt. His face was mostly obscured by the visor of a black baseball cap – the same one he had already worn once on their trip to the Alclad. Seifer found that look rather flattering on the brunette, and apparently, Selphie seemed to agree.

"Hey, you look cute in a hat, Squall!" the dark blonde girl noticed, beaming at him. He acknowledged the compliment with nothing but a pissed off grunt as he dropped into the bench across from Seifer, keeping his head low and his arms crossed in front of his chest. The blond could see his muscles twitching through the fabric of his shirt, and he tilted his head in suspicion.

"What's up, sunshine?" the blond teased lightly. "Nice to see _your _smiling face today."

"Whatever," Squall bit back, grabbing the second menu that was sitting on the table to conveniently bury his face in it. Selphie and Seifer exchanged perplexed glances, before the young waitress finally shrugged off her friend's foul mood and placed her free hand on her hip.

"Well, then," she drawled, studying the two glasses of water sitting between the two boys on the table that their waiter had brought a few minutes ago. "You want anything to drink other than water?"

"Nah, I'm good," Seifer declined. Squall, on the other hand, only let out an indistinct sound of displeasure.

"Fine," the girl sighed, turning around towards the kitchen. "I think Sean's your waiter. He'll come take your orders in a minute. I gotta take care of my tables, but I'll be back in a little while."

"'Kay," Seifer said curtly as he watched her walking away, before turning his attention to Squall, who was still hiding behind the oversized menu. The blond watched him for a few moments, waiting for some kind of acknowledgment of his own existence from the dark haired teen. When he didn't get one, he rested his chin in his right palm with a sigh and drew back his leg under the table to give Squall a hearty kick in the shins.

"Ow!"

Furious, the brunette slapped his menu down on the table and glared at Seifer as if he wanted to shove the next best piece of cutlery down the blond's throat. Seifer merely smiled back at him sweetly, looking for the world as innocent as a newborn baby.

"Hey there," he cooed, winking at the brunette with the audacity of someone who just didn't know what was good for him. "Fancy seeing you here. You come here often?"

The other boy's storm blue eyes were sparking with anger and irritation, framed by sleek, chocolate brown tresses of hair that seemed more unruly than usual, despite the hat. This was the first good look that Seifer had been able to take at the brunette since his arrival, and he didn't quite like what he saw. Squall looked different than he had during math class this morning, and the changes hadn't been for the better. His sour features appeared to be frozen in place, and that chronic weariness to his face seemed more pronounced than usual. Out of instinct, Seifer wanted to reach across the table and check the brunette's wrists, just to make sure that Squall hadn't gone razor happy on himself again, but he convinced himself not to.

He had no intentions of providing the brunette with a convenient excuse to get up and leave.

"What's wrong?" Seifer finally asked, the gentleness in his tone catching Squall off guard. There was a slight shift in the brunette's posture. His eyes narrowed slightly and he inched back to survey Seifer with an air of skepticism. Finally, he shook his head, and his inflection was less harsh when he spoke.

"Nothing."

"You look like you're in a bad mood," Seifer observed, watching the dark haired boy intently. Squall would show no overt reaction to his statement; he simply sat there and stared at the blond as if he was seriously contemplating throwing something at him.

"I'm fine," the brunette ultimately deadpanned, before returning his gaze to the menu.

Of course, he was anything _but_ fine, and Seifer was perfectly aware of that. He knew Squall well enough by now to pick up on changes in his behavior and facial expressions, but the reasons for the brunette's mood swings still kind of eluded him. He hadn't seen a glimpse of Squall since this morning, and it was late in the afternoon now. He figured that the dark haired teenager had maybe gotten into a fight with someone, either at home or at school, or perhaps this was about something entirely different.

"There's something on your mind," Seifer eventually guessed, not even really surprised when Squall looked up to glare at him.

The guy really _was _almost too predictable.

"Does it have anything to do with the dance tomorrow?" the blond continued, taking another shot in the dark. The brunette's eyes were flickering like candlelight in a draft of cold air, and he opened his mouth, but quickly closed it again, as if he had suddenly reconsidered his words and decided it was best to stay silent.

Seifer sighed softly.

"So that's it," he murmured, trying not to sound too satisfied with himself. "Look, Squall, it's just a dance. What are you worried about?"

"I'm not," Squall bristled, grimacing. "I just..."

Seifer tilted his head. "You just what?"

Squall looked back at him, thinking. He had no idea what to say. Seifer couldn't know that Squall's mother had told Kato about the dance only a couple of hours ago, right before spending several hundred dollars on an outfit for her son. Squall had passed the earlier part of the afternoon at the mall with her, picking out dress clothes for the ball. It was a task he had been rather reluctant to accomplish. He had done his best to seem enthusiastic, if only to please his mother, but ever since her phone call with Kato, his mood had quickly gone downhill. She hadn't told the man who her son was going to the dance with, but Squall figured that it probably didn't even make much of a difference.

The man would be completely livid, and Squall would be alone again tonight.

Alone with _him_.

Squall buried his face in his hand, wincing mutely. He dreaded this evening, almost as much as he dreaded tomorrow night. He couldn't believe that he was honestly planning on pulling through with this, after everything that had already happened and everything that was yet to come.

'_What was I thinking...'_

Suddenly, he felt Seifer touching the underside of his arm, and out of impulse, Squall quickly jerked back. With a near paranoid expression, he stared at the blond, who gave him a lowbrow look.

"What's the matter with you?" Seifer asked skeptically, obviously puzzled by Squall's abnormally jumpy behavior.

"Don't touch me," Squall hissed back angrily, keeping his voice low. His tone was sharper than he had intended it to be, and he hastily tried to soften the blow. "... We're in public."

That logic didn't seem to make much sense to the blond, because his expression was blank, and almost offended. Cocking his head and furrowing his brows, he said, "I was touching your _arm_ - I wasn't tongue fuckin' you or anything, princess. Take it easy."

"Shut up!" Squall snarled, glancing around to see if any other patrons or waiters were within earshot. Luckily, nobody seemed to be able to overhear their conversation. There was far too much ambient noise to go around.

"Why are you so worried about what anyone might think?" Seifer inquired, raising his hands in a gesture of indifference. "Who gives a shit, really."

"_I _do, asshole," the brunette bit. "This is my workplace."

"Again, I'm not throwing you down on the table and ripping your clothes off, or anything," Seifer sighed, then licked his lips. "Although that sounds like a pretty good idea right now."

"I will fucking _kill_ you," Squall hissed, no room for humor in his voice. "You're pissing me the fuck off!"

"Like I can't tell," Seifer snorted cynically. "Pull that stick out of your ass and relax a little, sweetpea. Everything's fine."

"No! No, it's _not_!" Squall snapped, sounding almost hysterical despite the fact that he was still trying to keep his volume low. "You're acting like this is a fucking game, and it _isn't_!"

Seifer attempted to give a reply, but Squall abruptly slid out of his seat and snarled acidly, cutting him off, "Shut up! I'm goin' to the bathroom."

He stalked off, taking his heated temper with him, and the blond was too dumbfounded to even follow him and cause a proper scene. In all honesty, he wasn't sure what the fuck had just hit him. Squall's wayward anger had struck out of nowhere. Seifer had believed himself to be on his best behavior today, but apparently, Squall didn't share his opinion. It only hammered home the fact that he really didn't comprehend the dark haired boy's mindset at all.

'_What in fuck's name is his problem? I don't know what the hell I did this time, but it must've yanked his chain pretty hard. He's acting like I just outed him to the whole restaurant. And hell, so what if I had? This is bullshit. Here's someone I actually wanna have a proper relationship with, for **once**, and he doesn't want me anywhere near him. That's just fuckin' excellent.'_

Meanwhile, Squall had made his way to the back of the restaurant, looking as if all hell had just taken a huge dump on him. However, he never managed to make it to the restrooms. Somehow, out of nowhere, Selphie had appeared and planted herself straight in the middle of Squall's path, looking strangely infuriated.

"Squall," she said sternly, looking up at him with both of her hands planted on her hips. "What is _wrong _with you?"

He stopped dead in his tracks and glared at her, wanting to lash out once more, but for some reason, being confronted by her was different. He couldn't be as hateful to her as he could be to Seifer. In some ways, she was like an odd mix between his mother and his little sister to him, and although she could be annoying to no end, he appreciated the fact that she cared about him as much as she did. Still, what business of hers was it why he was upset? This was none of her concern. Every muscle in his body was tense as he stood there in the hallway, his cold blue eyes burning into hers, wanting her to just get the hell lost.

"Nothing," he growled the same generic response he had already given Seifer.

Only Selphie wasn't so easily appeased.

"I saw you blowing up on Seifer just now," she stated plainly, watching how his face fell and his skin paled a shade or two. Obviously, he was immensely bothered by the idea of outsiders catching a glimpse of his and Seifer's chaotic relationship.

To Selphie's eyes, the dark haired boy had never quite looked this panicked before.

"He's a pest," Squall admitted reluctantly, trying to catch himself. "He always has to cause a fucking scene, no matter where we are. It pisses me off."

"No offense, but I think _you_ were the one causing a scene this time," she said, the calmness in her voice taking the edge off the statement.

"It's _his _fault! He always gets all touchy feely, and I can't stand it!" the brunette barked, looking exasperate. She watched him placing one hand on top of the visor of his baseball cap, pushing it down lower into his face as he shifted his weight from one foot to another. His frustration was almost palpable.

"Squall. Seifer _likes_ you," Selphie murmured patiently, as if talking to a child. "Do you really need me to explain that part to you?"

He went motionless for a moment, keeping his head bowed to stare at both of their feet. He was holding his arms tightly clasped in front of his chest now, and she could hear him breathing sharply in and out, seemingly trying to calm the storm raging inside of him. His temper had always been a mystery to her. Squall Leonhart could be the quietest, most well-behaved, and most unobtrusive guy she had ever met, always with a clumsy streak of gentleness to him that shone especially bright when he was around his little sister. Then, on some days, he could go ballistic at the drop of a dime, and he'd lash out at anyone who was unlucky enough to cross his path.

He managed to produce his very own and very scary personification of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

"Cut him some slack," Selphie continued eventually, studying the boy who was about an arm's length away from her. "He really _is_ trying. Can't you tell? Squall, I think he'd do _anything_ to make you happy, if only you'd let him know how."

When her gentle words inadvertently touched the foundation of his being, Squall finally let out a sound of resignation. Somehow, Selphie had managed to diffuse his anger as she so often did, leaving him with nothing but a knot in his stomach and a pang of guilt stubbornly gnawing at his insides. He knew well enough that Kato's behavior was not Seifer's fault, and that his anger should be directed towards his stepfather alone. Still, Seifer had been an accessible outlet for his fear and frustration. He did nothing to simplify the emotions that Squall had been trying to sort through for days. The brunette cared for the blond, he truly did, but Seifer always managed to complicate this already cluster-fucked situation, and it brought more stress on Squall than the dark haired boy could handle at the moment.

"You're still going to the ball tomorrow, right?" the girl now asked, her inflection careful. She noticed him cringing in response, but didn't understand why. Her best guess was that Squall was seriously considering to stand Seifer up.

"I don't know," Squall answered truthfully, his voice rusty and low. He still wouldn't meet her eye.

"Don't do that to him," she said, shaking her head. "You're better than that."

"He'll be fine," the brunette grunted. "He'd just take someone else."

"No, he wouldn't, and you _know_ that. Don't try to convince yourself that he doesn't give a shit, because he does," Selphie chided, almost sounding upset. "You're going too far, Squall."

"You don't know him that well."

She drew her eyebrows together, even though she knew Squall couldn't see her frowning at him. "I know him well enough to see that he's crazy about you. Something _you've_ apparently failed to notice."

"Whatever."

"I don't understand you, Squall," she sighed, eyeing him with an air of desperation. "The last time I saw you guys together you seemed to be getting along so well. Something is not right with you today. Just what is on your mind?"

He wrapped his arms tighter around his own body, and his head streaked to the side. She saw his face, and noticed just how lost he really looked. Perhaps the idea of being with Seifer scared him more than she had originally anticipated, and that realization alone caused her resolve to lecture him to ultimately cave in.

Shaking her head with a mute sigh, she stepped up to him and wrapped both arms around his narrow waist, squeezing him tight. He tensed at the physical contact, and she petted his back languidly in return. This wasn't the first time she had given him a hug, and the ritual had always been the same. That boy really scared so easily.

"You're a big doofus," she said in a hushed tone of voice. "Stop worrying so much. Your brain's gonna explode, and I don't wanna have to clean up the mess, okay?"

She released him, knowing that he'd endure her clinging on to him only for so long. He was looking down at her, insecurity glowering in his pale blue eyes. Honestly, the boy was like a little brother to her, so inexperienced and clumsy and all around far too much on edge. She couldn't help but care for him dearly, the way probably only a sister could.

"I'll see you at the dance tomorrow, okay?" she whispered, the words sounding like a statement more so than a question. Her green eyes were beaming up at him like bright emerald gems, and he returned her gaze silently, just looking at her for a long time.

Finally, he nodded very slowly.

She smiled in relief, but didn't speak another word, afraid that she might say just one thing too much. Very quietly, she stepped around him and disappeared from the hallway, back into the main part of the restaurant.

Squall, however, remained in that same position, his head so low that his chin was almost touching his chest. Something was echoing inside his head. They were threats more so than just words, spoken by his stepfather over the years, catalogued by Squall's young mind as nasty little keepsakes. For a moment, he wished he could just fall asleep and fade from this world, so he would never have to listen to all of these things inside his head ever again.

"... I'm sorry."

And just like that, it stopped. His mind went blank when he unexpectedly heard Seifer's voice behind him, whispering a gruff apology that was interlaced with a raw sway of emotion.

He half turned, finding the blond youth standing about a foot away from him in the hallway, looking contrite. There was something almost boyish about his normally grown-up, ridiculously good looks, just in the way he was keeping his head half lowered, half tilted to the side. Squall gazed back at him for a few seconds, his pale face clean of expression. Their bodies weren't touching, yet their hearts would seem interlocked to anyone witnessing the intense way they were staring at each other. These were two young men that cared greatly for one another, no matter how often they might pretend that they didn't.

"I wasn't trying to piss you off," Seifer finally explained, a note of helplessness to his inflection. He performed a vague gesture with his hand, almost as if he had wanted to reach out and touch Squall, but didn't. "I swear, this isn't a game to me, Squall. It's far from it, in fact. I promise."

They continued to face each other for a while longer, not saying another word, until Squall finally heaved a deep sigh and let his arms drop to the sides of his body, looking distinctly more at ease than he had. Seifer saw how one corner of his mouth quirked into a quick, almost annoyed smile, before he pulled his hat lower into his face and brushed past the blond, muttering, "Let's eat, idiot."

And with that, he walked back to their table, not minding the eighteen year old with another word or gaze as he left. Seifer watched him thoughtfully, but his focus was distant. His apology to Squall had been genuine, and he was relieved that it had been accepted, yet part of him still felt that he had done nothing wrong. Personally, he didn't care whether anyone found out that him and the brunette were as good as an item, but Squall seemed terrified at the mere possibility of it.

'_What's he so worried about? Is it his parents, or the guys at school? They'll get over it eventually. Besides, I wouldn't let anyone hurt him. He's safe with me. He's got nothing to be scared of.'_

Well, for now, he decided that Squall was apparently in no mood to discuss the topic any further. And quite honestly, neither was he. There would be a time to address the brunette's hangups, but today was not it.

Today, all he wanted was to see Squall Leonhart smile.

* * *

With a start and a bright flash behind his eyes, Squall awoke.

For the frightening fraction of a moment, he didn't know where he was. Then, the memories came seeping back to him, and his body slowly relaxed. He was lying on his stomach in his bed, with the side of his face pressed firmly into one of his pillows. He tried to take a breath through his nose, but it seemed congested. There was a dull, throbbing ache thumping between his eyes, shooting from one of his temples to the other.

Groaning, he rolled over.

He felt a sharp spike of pain flaring up in his lower back and abdomen at the rash movement. His face contorted and he froze, holding his breath as if it would stop him from hurting.

Of course, the sudden tension only made things worse.

He laid on his back, staring at the ceiling, trying to collect his thoughts that were swimming aimlessly through his mind, which was dazed from the pain. He felt like he was wading through a swamp inside his head. The room was dark and quiet all around him. He twisted around slightly, chancing a glimpse at his alarm clock. It was well after 9pm. Fragments of what had happened earlier in the night seemed to come back to him, trickling in at a slow, constant rate.

'_Kato...'_

His left hand gradually moved towards his face, touching his own nose. Something dried and crusty covered the skin between his upper lip and his nostrils. The boy's fingers slipped downwards, trailing along his throat, which felt abnormally sore and tight.

With a groan, he closed his eyes.

He shifted onto his left side, pulling his knees closer to his chest. He was wearing a white hooded sweatshirt and black nylon track pants. Still, he was freezing. A shiver rippled through his body, and he pulled his arms tightly around himself. The pressure aggravated the pain in his stomach, and his wrists were stinging for some odd reason, but at this very moment, he didn't care about any of that.

He was just so fucking cold.

He hadn't been asleep for the past two hours as some might have presumed; instead, he had been completely comatose. The last thing he could really bring himself to remember was the feeling of Kato's heavy body on top of his own, shoving his face into the pillow until everything around him had been swallowed by darkness. Kato had choken him, and his nose had been bleeding then, which had only complicated the task of breathing. He figured that Kato had hit him at some point or another to cause him a nosebleed, but he couldn't recall what exactly had had happened. His mind just felt sort of blurred and fuzzy around the edges.

No matter how long he laid there, gazing at the wall and floor length windows in front of him, he couldn't remember everything that had come to pass that night. Of course, he realized that this was bad. He had never lost consciousness like this before, and now his memory was missing vital bits and pieces.

'_Why can't I remember...?'_

Of course, there were some things that still stood out quite clearly in his head. He distinctly remembered Kato confronting him in the hallway outside his room that evening, once Squall's mother had left the house with Ellone. They had argued about the school ball, but Squall couldn't pinpoint what exactly had been said between them. He figured that he had to have mouthed off to some degree to have ended up with a bloody nose. After all, Kato didn't usually resort to hitting him, because his hands often tended to leave marks. Still, Squall wasn't entirely sure what he could have possibly have said or done to provoke this. Honestly, the next thing he could easily remember was Kato jerking him through his bedroom, throwing him down on the bed and yanking off his clothes. Everything after that, he would have much rather forgotten.

The boy let out a long, hollow sigh, trying to redirect his train of thought. He could hardly even make out what day it was. Tomorrow was Homecoming, he knew that much. It would only be a half day of classes. The rest of the day would be filled with games, some lame football match, even lamer celebrations, and of course, in the evening, the school dance. Right now, he wanted nothing to do with any of it. Every inch of movement that he managed to coax from his muscles sent sizzling sparks of pain through his entire body, rendering him nearly immobile. He was seventeen years old, and at this point, he felt like a fucking corpse.

Then again, he had never exactly felt 'alive' to begin with.

He wanted to just go back to sleep, but he knew better than to go to bed with a bloody nose and likely an array of other body fluids splattered on his clothes. The thought itself brought a sour taste to his mouth, and his stomach revolted just as it always would. When he felt his mind reeling, he quickly shoved the images of Kato's abuse back into that distant, hazy domain in his memory, where their horror never affected him quite as much. It was a poor and ineffective coping mechanism, but for now, it actually worked surprisingly well. He was pleased to find himself not hurting nearly as much as he normally would, at least on an emotional level. But perhaps this was due to the fact that the full magnitude of tonight's abuse hadn't hit him just yet. Right now, his mind was far too sluggish for him to recall every gruesome little detail, and that was a good thing. It was a comfortable numbness that he usually couldn't achieve unless he was slicing his own wrists open with that box cutter he had hidden in one of the drawers in his bathroom.

'_Don't... Don't even think about it... Not now...'_

Squall exhaled very slowly and deliberately. He could feel his heart suddenly racing in his chest. Something inside of him was gravitating towards that bathroom, longing to bleach every last tormenting mental picture of Kato from his brain. It was so easy, really. He knew exactly what to do.

'_Stop...'_

Shaking his head, he tried to deny himself that desire to cut himself that had erupted somewhere deep inside of him. He felt like an addict fighting against the urge to give in to his vice, and perhaps, in some ways, he was exactly that. Honestly, he wasn't sure whether this was all just an act of self preservation anymore, or if it had become more dangerous than that. He only knew that it was harder for him to deal with the emotional agony than the physical kind. He could handle cuts and bruises, and even that sensation of being ripped apart from the inside, because Squall Leonhart had a staggering tolerance for pain.

What he couldn't handle were the reflections of it all, playing over and over inside his head, with that stench of his stepfather still imprinted sharply into his sensory system.

'_I can't do this...'_

Just as he mentally steeled himself for the hurt he would cause himself by getting up and making his way to the bathroom, he heard an odd noise coming from his nightstand. He glanced up, confused, only to find his cell phone sitting next to his table top lamp, beeping once or twice more before falling silent. The display of the small, silver mobile device was brightly illuminated.

'_That's not my ringtone. What the hell...'_

He stretched his arm and reached for the phone, instinctively taking a glimpse at the display. A sudden crease appeared between his eyebrows when he saw the system message appearing on the screen.

**1 new text message**

'_Text message? What do you mean? I've never gotten a text message before. Who would send me that?'_

Perplexed, he flipped his phone open and tapped one of the buttons that allowed him to open and read the message. With surprise, he found that it had been sent to him by a very familiar blond.

**Yo kitten, it's Seifer. R u getting this?**

Squall glared at the screen in irritation, not sure whether or _how_ to even answer this. He had never written anybody a text message before. Everyone in school did it, and he had always considered it a waste of time. Why send someone a message if you could just call them or talk to them in person? If anything, he had always considered text messaging an act of laziness.

Finally, however, his curiosity got the better of him, and he decided to hit the reply button. It took him a minute to figure out the configuration of his keys, but after a few futile tries of composing a message, he had finally gotten the hang of it.

**Yeah. I am.**

Wrinkling his face, he allowed his phone to send out the message. Then he laid there, holding the mobile in his hand, staring at the screen as if he fully expected it to explode. For once, he had forgotten _all_ about Kato and the horrors of tonight.

It seemed to take only seconds before the display lit up once more and the phone chirped a high pitched tone, which he muffled by covering the device with his shirt sleeve.

'_Annoying piece of shit. You're gonna wake everyone up!'_

**Sweet! Didn't kno if u could get txt msgs. I'm bored as all hell. U doin ok?**

Squall screwed up his face. His fingers started to spell out something about not feeling too well, but he quickly erased the words again before his mind could even fully finish the thought process. Perhaps, he figured, it was actually easier to type something and send it, rather than to say it out loud.

'_Is that why people send text messages?'_

He shifted slightly in his position, wincing at the stabbing pain in his stomach. Gritting his teeth, he resumed typing his reply to Seifer.

**Can't sleep.**

He had hit the send button before he had even fully realized what he was doing. Fortunately, he didn't have much time to ponder his actions any further, because Seifer had sent him a reply almost instantly.

**Why? What's wrong?**

Drawing a very sniffling breath through his clogged up nose, Squall pulled his legs a bit tighter to his chest. He was still laying on his side, cradling the phone in his left hand and typing with his right. Fine fringes of his dark brown hair kept falling into his eyes, and he brushed them aside lazily. There seemed to be dried blood on his fingers, and he assumed that it had splashed on his hands when his nose had been bleeding. His wrists were burning every time he moved, but he didn't even think anything of it.

He was much too used to pain to find it the least bit extraordinary.

'What's wrong?'

Frowning, Squall blew out a breath. This wasn't a question that could be answered easily, at least not by him.

He didn't want to lie. He was getting so fucking sick of it.

**Nothing. I don't know.**

He sent the message and laid his head back into his pillow, sighing. Again, his phone beeped at him within seconds. It was almost reassuring to know that the guy at the other end of the line cared enough to send him stupid messages in the middle of the night. Then again, perhaps Seifer had absolutely nothing better to do.

**Anything I can do?**

Squall blinked at the digital words once or twice. He turned inwards for a moment, trying to find an honest answer to Seifer's question. That void that he usually felt gaping within him after one of Kato's attacks did not seem to be there right now. He was hurting, naturally, but the pain didn't feel nearly as raw and unbearable as it usually did. Somehow, the surprise effect of receiving Seifer's message had taken the edge off the whole traumatic experience. Squall's breathing was calm, and his body was no longer shivering. He figured that the memories would come back to him eventually, and that it likely wouldn't even take long, but for now, he actually felt alright.

It was nothing he couldn't handle, anyhow.

**You already did. Thanks. Night.**

It took about a minute or so for Seifer to respond this time. Squall figured that he had probably confused the hell out of the blond with his random words of gratitude, and he found that concept somewhat comical.

'_I guess I've never really thanked him for much of anything before. It never even occurred to me.'_

**Anytime, hot stuff. Good nite & c u tomorrow. Need anything else, u lemme kno, cupcake.**

Squall rolled his eyes at the blond's vast array of pet names for him. He hadn't felt the need to make up a name for Seifer yet; so far, 'asshole' had served him just fine.

'_He doesn't even seem to care that I cuss him out, either. He really is weird. Does anything faze that guy? Well, whatever... ugh. I guess I should get cleaned up...'_

With a small yawn, Squall placed the phone back on his nightstand. He continued to lay on his bed for a little while longer, staring holes into the darkness, his mind comfortably numb, as if sealed against the violent events from earlier tonight. Finally, when he felt himself slowly drifting off into a precarious near-sleep state, he raked together all of his willpower and pushed himself into a seating position.

Sitting up hurt. Standing up and walking towards the bathroom was almost enough to make him vomit. His steps were sluggish and had an unnatural stiffness to them as he was dragging his socked feet across the carpet. He was lightheaded, too, and the motions made him strangely nauseated. Squall wanted nothing more than to drop back into bed and go to sleep, but he forced himself to trudge into the bathroom instead. Groaning, his fingers felt for the switch located right beside the door.

The moment that he flicked on the lights and the room before him became brightly illuminated, Squall's body went rigid.

An image of Kato laying on top of him suddenly flashed on the canvas of Squall's inner eye, hitting him out of nowhere, just like the white brightness of the light bulbs. He could hear the man moaning, breathing down the side of his neck as his hands were digging into Squall's hips, thrusting against them rhythmically. The brunette flinched, and he could feel the little hairs on the back of his neck beginning to stand. Hastily, he closed his eyes, shutting out that disturbing mental picture that had completely blindsided him.

He remained like that for several moments, swaying slightly from side to side as a wave of dizziness and nausea rushed over him.

When he finally opened his eyes once more, all he could see was red.

'_Red...?'_

The brunette's grey eyes went wide as he stared at the room before him, trying to understand what he was seeing. The white tiles on the side of the bathtub and the floor were smeared with barely dried streaks of dark red blood. He could even make out a few bits of blood spray along the cherry wood cabinets, and something that looked significantly like a hand imprint next to one of the towel holders. There was blood in the sink, on the mirror, and all over the faucets.

For a moment, time simply seemed to stop ticking as the intensity of that picture nearly knocked the ground out from underneath him.

'_What is this...?'_

He didn't understand. Not even when he saw the box cutter laying in a corner on the floor and it, too, was covered in blood. The narrow, silver blade was shimmering a crimson red in the reflection of the light, standing as silent testimony to the tragedy that had unfolded in this room tonight.

Very slowly, Squall dropped his gaze. He looked at his hands, his expression stunned. His palms were covered in dark, sticky red liquid that had dried to a patchy crust in most places. With a look of horror on his face, the brunette inched his fingertips beneath his left shirt sleeve and slowly hiked it up.

Even he couldn't believe what he found.

The inside of his wrist had been brutally mutilated. Several deep, long gashes ran horizontally across the narrowest part of his limb, and most of them were still oozing blood. The more Squall stared at his own arms, the less he wanted to accept what he was seeing.

"Oh... my _god_..."

The room before him started to spin as the adrenaline kicked in, and Squall collapsed against the door frame, hitching a few quick, shallow breaths into his lungs. His stomach made a dull, squelching noise, and he almost threw up right then and there. One of his hands found his forehead, and he wrenched his fingers into his hair as he shook in fear.

'_What have I done...?'_

He knew full well what the bloody mess in front of him meant, and who had caused it. He realized that he had cut himself that night, but what scared him more than anything was the fact that he absolutely could _not_ remember doing it.

'_This is insane. I'm losing my mind.'_

There wasn't a fragment of remembrance in Squall's brain. None whatsoever. He had experienced small memory lapses before, especially after a particularly violent night in Kato's company, but nothing like this. This was completely out of control. No matter how much he racked his mind, he couldn't find anything related to this evening aside from Kato's sexual assault on him. How could something with this much impact, this much significance, just be completely wiped from his memory?

Of course, he understood now why his wrists had been stinging earlier, and why he had been feeling so goddamn lightheaded. There was an alarming amount of blood splashed all over the bathroom.

'_No wonder I was out cold...'_

He took a deep breath, trying not to panic. He told himself that this wasn't the first time he had ever experienced a significant blood loss; his body usually compensated just fine, and he always recovered rather quickly. However, he had _never_ had to deal with such an unsettling case of amnesia before.

'_Maybe I just... forgot about it because I fainted. I don't know. I don't remember going in here at all... and I certainly don't remember cutting myself like this. What the hell did I do? How could this happen? What if Mom would have seen this? Everything would have been over. Shit... I can't believe this. I am so fucking screwed...'_

He felt disturbed beyond comparison, and betrayed by his own body. He had heard of victims repressing the memories of traumatic events before, but this was different. This was something he had done to himself, and it hadn't been the first time by a long stretch. The recollections of Kato raping him that night were still there, like a sick, twisted failsafe reminder of how dirty his body was inside and out, and yet those memories of cutting himself were gone without a trace.

It didn't make any sense.

He felt helpless as he sat down on the edge of the bathtub, staring at the chaos all around him. He didn't even know where to begin fixing it. His grey eyes were darting aimlessly around the room, trying to find a specter of recognition, but he found nothing. As much as he tried to tell himself that this wasn't a big deal, he knew better than that.

Something was seriously wrong.

Out of impulse, he took a glance at his right wrist, only to find it looking just as ghastly as the left one. His eyebrows twitched, but he showed no other, visible sign of emotion. Swallowing down his anxiety, he continued to take toll of the damage caused to his property and physique. There were random white liquid stains splattered around the top part of his track pants. With a sickened grimace, Squall hastily yanked the pants down to his ankles and kicked them off. They landed in a corner by the toilet, and Squall was left wearing nothing but socks, black boxer shorts and a white sweater that was sullied with blood. He saw his own, bare legs trembling, and he forced them to still.

'_This is getting out of hand,'_ he thought, exhaling sharply. _'Pull yourself together! Ugh... This is crazy. I don't even wanna know what my bed looks like right now. I'll deal with that later. First, I have to take care of this...'_

With a look of determination and complete disregard for his own lack of strength, Squall jumped to his feet. He lost his tread almost instantly as his right foot slipped on a splotch of blood, sending him crashing onto his ass and onto the tiled floor. He let out a hiss of pain as he fell with his back against the hard bathtub, banging up whatever part of his body wasn't screaming in agony already.

"God _dammit_... ugh..."

Groaning, he doubled over and clenched his eyes shut. Pain was lancing up and down his spine, and for a moment, he could hardly breathe. He wanted to scream at the top of his lungs, but instead, he bit down and swallowed all of his hurt and frustration. Somehow, things always managed to go from bad to worse, even when he thought that he had already hit rock bottom. His pride and courage were dissolving all around him as he sat there, his legs partially drawn to his torso and his hands wrenching into his own shirt as he wrestled down the cramps in his stomach.

'_I... can't do this... anymore...'_

He felt the truth of those words more than he ever had before. They were stinging, like poison in his heart, and despite all his bravado and all his admirable perseverance, he finally had to admit to himself that his body had reached its limits.

Everything was shutting down on him, and there was nothing he could do.

'_I can't... I won't... let that happen. I won't. I... have no choice.'_

Because that choice had been made for him a long time ago. His mother, or himself – he couldn't achieve happiness for both of them, at least not right now. So he would suffer, and he would bleed, and he would take it, because she needed him to.

Kato had challenged his stepson's protective nature, just as he had challenged his instinct to survive. Squall wasn't going to give up, because he realized that his family depended on him, much more than they would ever be able to know. The brunette's emotional wounds would never fully heal, but his body would regenerate over time, and he would go on, standing against the tests of Kato's vile imagination once more.

Never knowing that there had always been another way.

-:-

It's quiet now  
Like the moments after a murder  
The younger me inside  
Can't believe the things he saw tonight  
Face to face, I'm screaming at myself  
Face to face, I'm screaming at myself  
For help.

_"The Enemy Inside" - Egypt Central_

-:-


	27. Where Are You Tonight, Part 1

-:-  
**Chapter 27  
****Where Are You Tonight (Part I)**

"_Dance with me."  
_-:-

There's a white diamond gloom on the dark side of this room

And a pathway that leads up to the stars

If you don't believe there's a price for this sweet paradise

Remind me to show you the scars.

"_Where Are You Tonight" – Bob Dylan_

-:-

He couldn't have said how many school dances he had attended during his time in Balamb, even if he had made a sincere effort to remember how many there had been, or who he had gone with. At some point or another, he had simply lost count. Poor, unassuming girls from his own school and neighboring schools would ask him to be their date, and he would get inappropriate enjoyment out of turning most of them down. His partners had to have particular 'qualities', so to say, because Seifer, the primordial school jock, would never go on a date with just anyone. Popularity, ridiculously good looks and a proportional amount of narcissism had turned the blond teenager into a genuine snob who would only take a girl to a dance if she was hot, dressed like a hooker in training and practically belly flopped into his bed at the end of the night. There had been many evenings when he had left a dance with a different girl than he had arrived with. Broken hearts and angry tears had meant nothing to him. He had rarely bothered with flowers, compliments and such sentimentalities as pictures or fond memories that would fade over time anyway, because honestly, he had never really given a shit.

But tonight, everything was different.

Seifer was sitting in the driver's seat of his pick-up truck, making his way to Squall Leonhart's house on this beautiful Friday evening. He had been looking forward to this night for days, because he would be taking Squall to his very first Homecoming dance ever. Originally, the blond had wanted to rent an expensive limousine in honor of the occasion, but he had made the unfortunate mistake of sharing his plans with Squall. As a result, his obstinate brunette love interest had informed him quite plainly that Seifer would do better to scratch the idea from his mind at once, if he had any kind of sentimental attachment to his ball sack at all.

Naturally, Seifer had no interest in parting with his crown jewels and had therefore decided to show up on Squall's doorstep in his own vehicle. Despite his lack of a fancy ride, he was excited like a little kid on Christmas Eve. The tickets to the dance that he had bought for Squall and himself were sitting in the fold-down console between his seat and the passenger seat, right next to his digital camera. He was fully planning on snapping plenty of pictures at the dance... particularly of his handsome date, of course. He had an empty photo album sitting at home already, ready to be transformed into Seifer's very own and personal Squall-themed porno collection.

'_Hey, I can't help that he's so fuckin' hot! Hehe. I think I may have a photo of him blown up to life size proportions and put it right above my bed!'_

He snickered and threw a semiconscious glance into his rearview mirror, checking out his own reflection. All arrogance aside, Seifer found that his mirror image looked quite pleasing. His short blond hair had been cut and smoothed back by the fancy hairdresser he had visited earlier in the day. The wheat colored strands looked striking against the contrast of his tanned skin and the dark, slightly shimmery green of his dress shirt that matched his eyes. The fabric was tight around his shoulders and his chest, advertising his muscular physique. By all means, if Seifer knew anything, it was how to fill out a shirt. He was also wearing an expensive pair of khaki slacks that fit just right, as well as a brown leather belt and some buffed dark brown leather shoes to pull his outfit together. He had actually bothered to wear a dark blue tie, only to look even more charming, but he figured that this accessory would come off in due time.

Hell, if he had it his way, _all_ of his clothes would be coming off by the end of the night, and not just his own, but Squall's as well.

'_Well, I'm not holding my breath or anything on getting laid tonight. I can't wait to fuck the living daylights out of him, I tell you that, but all in all I'm actually pretty happy with the way things are. I just want him to have a good time tonight. That's all I'm asking for. It's his first dance, and he's going with __**me**__. If I can get him to enjoy himself tonight, even a little bit, it'll all be worth it.'_

Oddly content with such simplicities, he drove down one of the roads in Squall's neighborhood. It was slowly getting dusky outside, but numerous iron wrought street lanterns were brightly illuminating his path, and the sun was still hanging low on the horizon. He had promised Squall to pick him up around 8pm, and as of right now, he actually had time to spare.

'_Guess I could drop by early and charm the socks off his mother. Yeah... I'd say that sounds like a pretty brilliant plan.'_

So he smirked lazily and continued on his way, and he managed to locate Squall's home without greater difficulty. When he pulled up in front of the white stucco house and parked his truck, he could feel a sudden surge of anxiousness in his chest the moment that he turned off the engine and silence engulfed him like a blanket. It was a very strange, skittish excitability that he had never quite felt like this before. His throat was tight, and he took a moment to swallow.

'_What the hell. I'm actually kind of... nervous? Uh... This is weird...'_

Shaking his head at himself, he took a deep breath and hopped out of the driver's seat. As his door slammed shut behind him, his curious gaze was already trained towards Squall's home. With one hand submerged nonchalantly in the pocket of his pants, he casually ambled towards the front gate, which was unlocked, just as it had been during his previous visits. Seifer wondered about the wealthy family's lack of security measures, but didn't think too much of it. Quite frankly, he had more important things on his mind.

With an even, unhurried stride, he made his way along the flagstone path, past the driveway that was lined with pale, blossoming Winter Sakura trees. His pace slowed, however, when he raised his eyes towards the main entrance of the mansion.

Seifer stopped dead in his tracks, looking startled as he stared at the unexpected image of Squall sitting languidly on the front steps of his home.

'... _Holy shit to the **fuck**__ almighty.'_

Squall was motionless on those stairs, doing nothing extravagant at all except _sit_ there, and yet the sight of him managed to knock the wind clean out of Seifer. The brunette was perched with his elbows resting on his knees and his head turned to the side, his gaze drifting off somewhere into the distance without purpose. Seifer, on the other hand, couldn't have taken his eyes off Squall if his life had depended on it. He stood paralyzed, staring until he thought his eyeballs might fall out of their sockets. Squall was a knock-out in black dress shoes and black slacks that clung to his legs in all the right places. He was wearing a dark colored belt with a narrow silver buckle, and a black button down shirt that was just tight enough to show off his flat abs and nicely toned shoulders. Honestly, his clothes couldn't have fit him any more perfectly if they'd been poured on his body. Squall had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, exposing his forearms that had been chiseled by grueling hours in the swimming pool. He was wearing a set of black leather wrist bands that Seifer hadn't seen on him before, and he was playing with them absent-mindedly, casually blowing a rogue, chunky strand of hair out of his eyes.

Within one small, seemingly insignificant fraction of time, Seifer had fallen in love all over again.

He would have been content just standing there, watching the brunette from afar, wondering just what he had done right for once to deserve something this beautiful in his life. Seifer had dated many attractive people in his days, but this was different. Nothing even compared.

Squall had completely taken his fucking breath away.

Suddenly, as if he had sensed the presence of another, the brunette's head flicked around towards him, and Squall's pale blue eyes flashed suspiciously, ruining that ethereal aura that seemed to surround him. For a second, Seifer almost sensed hostility emanating from the lithe brunette, until this unexpected display of resentment was suddenly swapped for something else entirely.

The brunette's eyes widened, and his gaze fixated upon Seifer in a strange, almost naïve expression of astonishment. Fine, dark brown fringes of hair were sweeping into his vision with the light sway of the wind, yet he never broke eye contact with Seifer, who was still standing in the middle of his driveway.

They stared at each other in silence, and Seifer knew that even when he'd be old and senile and unable to recall his own name, he'd have this picture so clearly in his mind that he'd think it might have been yesterday that Squall had made him fall head over heels with one single goddamn stare. In his typical, often oversized clothes, the brunette boy tended to look awkward and fragile, but he seemed as collected and grown up as anyone could as he sat there, holding Seifer's gaze. His looks would have put a professional model to shame, yet Seifer sensed that Squall was completely unaware of his own beauty.

There was so much the brunette didn't know about himself and the effect he had on others. So much he still had to learn. It was almost ridiculous.

"You're early," the dark haired boy finally said, his tone calm, but free of emotion. Seifer heard him clearing his throat.

"I'm sorry," Seifer replied, not meaning one word of it. His eyes were gleaming as he continued to study every line and subtle movement of Squall's body with silent appreciation.

Squall shook his head. "I didn't say I was complaining."

He stood up, carefully brushing off his pants. Seifer wondered why he had been sitting outside, but he didn't ask. Instead, he crossed the distance between them, until they stood merely inches apart and the difference in height between them forced him to lower his head in order to look Squall in the eye.

"You look _incredible_," he said, his voice coming more husky and breathless than usual.

He watched intently how Squall's nose wrinkled in response and the brunette drew his eyebrows together.

"It's just clothes," he replied uncomfortably, tugging at his shirt as he dropped his gaze. "My mom picked them out."

Seifer chuckled in amusement over the boy's typical modesty. "It's more than just _clothes_, Squall. You are five kinds of fine."

"Whatever," Squall snorted, looking almost insulted, as if he fully believed that Seifer was only toying with him.

"I'm dead fuckin' serious!" Seifer insisted. "You're easily the best looking guy I've ever seen."

"Right. Says the guy who looks like a goddamn movie star," Squall grunted tightly, before abruptly lowering his eyes in a gesture of embarrassment.

Seifer blinked at those words, and a huge, self-satisfied grin spread across his face. He noticed an appealing shade of red hot crimson on the brunette's high, pale cheekbones, and he inclined his head further towards Squall to whisper softly, "Oh really, a movie star? So you think I look good, huh?"

Squall let out a sound of frustration and knocked his fist against Seifer's shoulder, pushing him aside.

"Get over yourself," the brunette quipped, crossing his arms in front of his chest as he rolled his eyes. Seifer could merely laugh at the pissed off look on his face, and he ruffled Squall's soft, dark brown hair very lightly.

"Don't hate," he snickered. "I know I may not be as cute as you, but I think I look pretty damn good myself."

"Don't call me cute, asshole," the brunette growled, turning up his right middle finger at Seifer, who was still grinning from ear to ear. "I'll kick your sorry ass!"

"Now, what is this?" a female voice suddenly interrupted their bantering. "You haven't even left yet, and you're already threatening to beat up your date? Honestly, darling. I taught you better than that."

Looking up, Seifer found a smiling dark haired woman standing in the doorway to the family's home. She was, of course, none other than Squall's mother. The petite woman looked comfortable in a long, heavy white pullover, jeans and house shoes, her face radiating pride as she beamed at her son. The brunette spun around quickly to face her, looking slightly on edge.

"Oh, Seifer," Raine cooed, tilting her head in awe as her eyes fell on the blond. "You look so handsome!"

"Why thank you," the blond answered politely, before swiping Squall an appraising sideways gaze and jabbing his thumb in the brunette's direction. "I think he's got me beat, though."

"You both look great," she insisted. "I'm really happy, you know. I haven't seen Squall dress up in _years_! You can take my son to a dance any time you'd like, Seifer!"

"Mom, I'm not a _girl_," Squall said gruffly, looking particularly offended.

"I know, sweetheart, I wasn't saying that. I just think you guys look _so_ wonderful!" she placated him. "Oh, gosh, before I forget, let me take some pictures of you!"

Before Squall could have stopped her, she had dashed inside the house and returned, within seconds, with her digital camera in hand. Seifer had to bite down a snort of laughter over the intense look of horror on Squall's face as his mother raised her camera and begun snapping pictures of the two of them just standing there in the driveway in bewilderment.

"Mom—"

"Oh, this is lovely," she chirped brightly, showing total disregard for her son's futile attempt to protest. "Move closer together, guys!"

Squall cringed when Seifer happily flung his arm around his shoulder, yanking him closer. For a moment, Squall seriously expected the perverted blond to lean in and plant a kiss on him, or do something else outrageous along those lines, and he struggled accordingly against Seifer's embrace. Of course, the eighteen year old would have none of that and he only tightened his hold, smirking in satisfaction as Raine continued to take picture after picture.

"Knock it off already," Squall snapped, elbowing Seifer in the side in annoyance. Finally, he managed to slip out of the blond's reach, and he took two steps back to glare at his mother in exasperation. "Mom, please!"

"Aw, come on, Squall," she pleaded, placing one hand upon her narrow hip with a sigh. "At least let me get a picture of the two of you where you don't look like you're about to bite your date's head off!"

"But—"

"Move together and hold still for just one minute, okay? Please? Come on, smile for me. It would really make me happy!"

Squall eyed her warily, debating his options. He looked repulsed at the idea of having his picture taken, but he loved his mother too much to deny her such a simple request, especially one that apparently meant so much to her. Something about her words had touched him on a deeper level than he liked to admit.

Finally, he rolled his shoulders in a shrug and raised his hands in a gesture of defeat.

"Fine, whatever," he said in a flattened tone of voice, sparing Seifer a pained sideways glare. "Let's get this over with."

Seifer needed no further invitation and stepped up to Squall once more. This time, he laced his arm around Squall's shoulder in a more considerate fashion, and although the brunette tensed initially, he quickly accustomed to Seifer's touch, which was no longer foreign to him. When he took time to concentrate and didn't just allow his flight instincts to take over, he actually enjoyed the blond teen's physical proximity. Seifer's physique was impressive, so large and strangely comforting, and the movement of his muscles against him produced a feeling inside Squall that was much closer to a state of arousal than the brunette had ever experienced before.

'_He really is attractive... The girls at the dance will go completely fucking gaga over him. Hmph. At least I won't have to put up with him for long. Someone's gonna come around and snatch him up soon enough. I'm sure Rinoa will be there and try to hang all over him again.'_

There was an icy spark in Squall's eyes as his thoughts gravitated towards Rinoa Heartilly, but nevertheless, he forced himself to smile when his mother continued to take pictures of him and his date. Then, suddenly, he felt Seifer's hand giving his shoulder a long, sure squeeze, and he threw the blond an irritated side glance. He was completely stunned by the affectionate, almost tender way that Seifer was gazing back at him, and for just one moment, Squall felt lost in the calm jade green of the other male's eyes.

Raine noticed the look on Seifer's face through the viewfinder of her camera, and she slowly lowered her lens. With interest, she watched how her son and his friend were gawking at each other, their expressions dominated mostly by teenage insecurity and a pure, almost naïve sort of affection. They seemed entangled in their own little world, lost within the thoughts of one another, and the glow on Seifer's handsome features was impossible to mistake.

'_Just as I thought...'_

She smiled thoughtfully and continued to watch her son with maternal fondness for a little while longer, not wanting to ruin the moment. She had wanted to see him happy and _consumed_ with someone else like this for so long, yet she had started to doubt that Squall would ever lower his defenses enough to allow another person to touch him just like this, not just physically but emotionally as well.

Whatever Seifer had done had moved mountains in Squall's world, and the brunette's mother had never felt more thankful.

'_I almost thought I'd never see him look at another human being like this... that maybe he'd spend the rest of his life scared of letting someone close to him. I know he's always been afraid that he isn't good enough... that he'll fall in love, make himself vulnerable, and then get left behind. All this... just because his father was never there. Oh, Squall... you have no idea.'_

Her heart was aching, both for him and for herself, but she couldn't allow herself to wallow in these distant memories. Instead, she continued to watch them, and finally, after witnessing these long moments of deep, burning looks full of romantic feelings that remained yet unspoken, she decided to clear her throat noisily.

Squall's head whipped around in response, and she noted the hunted look in his storm blue eyes. The poor kid was so easily unsettled. Sometimes she wondered just why he was so jumpy, but he had always reassured her that everything was fine when she had worried enough to ask.

"You guys better get going," Raine ordered gently as she titled her head with a smile.

"Oh..." Squall stammered, hastily shrugging out of Seifer's embrace. She noticed that his cheeks were burning. "Right..."

The blond merely smiled and cracked his knuckles.

"Do you need him back by a certain time?" he asked, obviously addressing the question to Raine.

"As long as you two keep together, I don't mind how late you stay out," she said. "Just be responsible, okay?"

"Of course," the blond agreed, when his gaze suddenly drifted from Raine to Squall and something lit up his face. "Hey, I have an idea. Let me take a picture of the two of you."

Squall flicked him a quick glare, looking dumbfounded. "What?" he asked blankly.

"I wanna take a picture of you and your mother," Seifer declared, already climbing up the stairs towards Raine, extending one hand. She was smiling gratefully as she handed him the camera, and as she brushed past him to move down the stairs, every tilt of her body was deliberate and as fluid as water, reminding Seifer that she had once been a talented ballerina dancer. Still, despite this knowledge, the grace of her filigree body was so hauntingly beautiful, it was almost painful to watch.

'_It's no secret where Squall got his great genes from. She is a stunning woman. They're both in a league of their own.'_

She swiveled around at the foot of the stairs, facing Seifer. Her head tilted in an almost swan-like fashion over her shoulder as she gazed at her son, who was standing behind her. Her eyes were pure gentleness as she motioned him to come closer. Wordless, the brunette stepped up to her side, allowing his mother to wrap her arms around his waist. Their closeness seemed natural, and he looked comfortable in her protective embrace. There was a small, true smile on Squall's lips as he inclined his head to rest his chin against her temple, and as Seifer captured that very delicate moment on digital film forever, he couldn't help but feel a painful jab in the very center of his chest. He wondered if his own mother had ever looked upon him like this, with so much pure and unconditional love that had not been tainted by years of unreasonable expectations and parental disappointments.

'_... I wish I had what Squall has. I want to feel loved like that just one time in my life.'_

Seifer hastily shook that feeling off, not wanting to ruin the evening with senseless thoughts of jealousy. Raine and her son had weathered a lot of difficult times together; it was only natural that their familiar bond would be far from average.

"Well... That'll be a really good picture," Seifer eventually said in a low voice as he stepped down to hand Raine her camera. The woman took it from him with a grateful smile.

"I'm sure," she nodded. "Thank you. I'll make sure to print you a copy, if you want."

"Thanks," Seifer responded, his arms now crossed behind his back as he thoughtfully rocked back and forth on the heels of his feet. Swiping Squall an unsure glance, he finally asked, "Well, you ready to go?"

Squall, who had looked engrossed in his thoughts, jerked slightly at the sound of Seifer's voice, and his steel blue eyes swerved from the blond to his mother, and back. Almost hurriedly, he nodded.

"Yeah."

Seifer noted a slight stiffness to the set of his shoulders. The boy suddenly looked uneasy. Raine seemed to miss or ignore this fact, because she simply smiled at both of them as she returned to the house, waving.

"Have fun, you two, and call me if you need anything! Squall, you have your phone on you, right?"

"Uh, yeah," Squall answered disjointedly, briefly running his hand over the back pocket of his pants.

"Okay. Good night, guys, and enjoy yourselves!"

"Sure will. Good night, and thanks!" Seifer exclaimed, watching her disappear inside the house and closing the door. For a moment, he wondered where Kato and Ellone were hiding, but he lost that train of thought as soon as he realized that Squall was already headed towards the street.

"What the... Hey, wait up!"

He jogged after the brunette, catching up with him by the truck. Curious, he screened the younger boy's face, finding no tangible sort of emotion. He opened the car door for Squall, who climbed inside without a word.

'_He seems... different. What the hell?'_

With a small frown, Seifer got into his seat, started the engine and begun to travel through the neighborhood and towards the freeway. All the while, Squall wouldn't honor him with a single word or glance. He looked rigid next to him, his arms clamped tightly before his body.

"Squall... what's the matter?" Seifer finally asked, not necessarily expecting a reaction.

Squall shifted, then murmured a defensive "Nothing" as he turned his face towards the window.

"Are you nervous or something?"

The brunette made a tiny growling sound, proving Seifer's presumption at least partly correct. With a sigh, the blond said, "Hey, there's nothing to be nervous about. You're with me."

"... Exactly."

The word had slipped out before Squall could've thought better of it. Seifer had noted the sarcasm to his tone, and it caught him off guard.

"What is _that_ supposed to mean?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Nothing," Squall bit back quickly, staring at his kneecaps. "Sorry."

"No, don't even try that shit on me right now," Seifer insisted, shaking his head. "Tell me."

"It doesn't mean anything," Squall repeated stoically. He could feel Seifer staring at him, but he refused to look up. He hoped that the blond was still watching the road, but he wasn't about to make sure.

"Do you think I'm going to do something to you?" Seifer asked incredulously, a minute shade of hurt to his voice. This finally caused the brunette to raise his head and turn towards Seifer just slightly. His fair skinned face suddenly looked taken aback.

"No, I... That's not..." he started, the words melting away as he tried to mold his thoughts into a proper sentence. Somehow, his mind was in chaos. He couldn't even make sense of his own thoughts, let alone feelings, right now. He didn't know what to say, and he didn't like the offended expression on Seifer's face.

There was a pang of guilt, flaring up in the deep center of his stomach.

'_... Shit.'_

"It's nothing like that," he finally murmured, rubbing the palm of his right hand against his forehead. "I just... We're two guys, and... we're going to this dance together... and..."

"And what? Look, I thought we were past all this," Seifer interrupted brashly, but when he saw the apprehension in Squall's eyes, he couldn't help but groan in frustration. "... Great. I guess not."

Squall chewed on the corner of his bottom lip, his dark brows low over his eyes. He couldn't possibly have looked any more uncomfortable.

"What got you all worked up about this all of a sudden? The pictures?" Seifer asked, sounding irritable now.

"No, I just... I don't know. I don't want my mother... I don't want anyone to think that... that..."

"That what?" Seifer cut in, the words sharper than he had intended. "That we're gay?"

Squall lowered his head once more, fidgeting with his wristbands. Frustrated, Seifer drummed his hands on the steering wheel.

"Why in all hell are you so worried about that?" he inquired, trying to at least _sound_ understanding. For some reason, this conversation seemed to require more patience than he had in store right now.

This wasn't at all how he had pictured the beginning of their evening. They were supposed to be happy. They were supposed to be having _fun_.

'_Can he enjoy __**anything**__ without being all paranoid about it first? There's worse things than people finding out that you're gay. I know, cause I've __**been**__ there. It sucks to be made fun of, but when everything is said and done, it's a lot better than pretending to be something you're not.'_

Apparently, Squall seemed to disagree. His face was tight with a nervousness that seemed to border to panic. He wasn't trying to piss Seifer off, but he also couldn't pretend that the subject of being open and public about their budding romance didn't bother him. For the time being, nobody – not Seifer, or Kato, or even Squall himself – realized just how stupidly in love the brunette was with his older classmate. He wanted none of that to change. He could accept the fact that people had started to believe that him and Seifer were friends, but he couldn't come to terms with anything beyond that. He was far too private of a person, and much too worried about the backlash they might receive. None of this was anyone's business but Seifer's and his own. Why should anyone need to know?

There were no benefits to it, and even if there were, they wouldn't be worth the consequences.

"I just don't want anyone to know," Squall muttered eventually, his voice nothing but a finite whisper against the fogging glass of his side window.

"... Why? What are you scared of?"

"Nothing. It's not about that."

Seifer snarled angrily. "Bull fucking shit."

Squall's features twitched. He, too, was getting unnerved with the situation.

"Why do you _want_ anyone to know? What's the damn point?" he asked right out, keeping his voice and his emotions as level as he could.

"I like being with you, Squall," Seifer snapped in exasperation. "I'm _proud_ of being with you. Maybe I don't want this to be some kind of secret. Maybe I want to show off the fact that we're together. Have you thought about _that_, idiot?"

Quite truthfully, that option had completely slipped Squall's mind. He was touched by Seifer's honesty, but it made things no easier. Sighing, he ran both of his hands through his hair and pressed them against his temple. His head was pounding, and he was in no mood whatsoever to be amongst a crowd of people right now, but at this point, he wasn't going to back out. He knew that he owed Seifer at least that much, but he wasn't sure how much more he'd be willing to give.

He stared out of the window, trying to think of things to say to ease the stiff silence between them. It was then that he realized that they had already arrived at the posh City Convention Hall, where this year's Homecoming dance was being held. His blue eyes were wide in awe, streaking across the parking lot that was saturated with cars and limousines, girls in long, sparkly dresses and guys in smug evening attire. He could hear music blasting all the way out here, far away from the actual ballroom.

Silently, he gulped against the lump in his throat. This whole thing was much further out of his comfort zone than he had ever imagined it would be.

With apprehension, he watched how the blond aptly maneuvered through the crowd and finally secured them a parking spot. When Seifer turned off the engine, it was quiet once more.

"Look... let's just forget about it for now and have a good time," Seifer finally suggested, seeming only mildly convinced by his own words that sounded strange amidst the silence. Truthfully, he was relieved when Squall nodded, unwilling to pursue the difficult subject any further. Determined, he picked up their tickets and waved them in front of Squall's face with a wry grin. "You still wanna go?"

The boy swallowed, but answered without hesitation. "... Yeah."

"Alright. Let's go then."

They exited the vehicle, and Seifer caught a glimpse of Squall from across the hood of his truck. The brunette's posture was tense as he stood there, looking around with a wary glint in his eyes. Seifer was sure that his younger friend had probably never felt more out of place than he did right now. Shaking his head, Seifer quietly motioned the handsome dark haired teen towards him.

"Come on," he ordered, fully aware that he would have to take control of the situation. "Follow me."

Truthfully, he was glad to see Squall following his lead instead of putting up another fuss, as he had almost expected him to. They had started to walk towards the entrance of the large building that mostly seemed to consist of snow white stone walls, brass ornaments and polished glass windows, and even amongst the crowd of perfectly dressed and groomed students, Seifer found that Squall stuck out like an elephant in a library. Many girls would stop dead in their tracks and whisper as the two of them passed by, with Squall following mere inches behind his tall, brawny blond classmates. He stayed closer to Seifer than he normally would, only because he couldn't bear the idea of having to face this madness on his own.

'_I can't believe I agreed to this. I must've been out of my mind. There are way too many people here. I can't do this, I—'_

Squall's thoughts jarred as he carelessly stepped down a curb and consequently felt a quick, piercing jab in the center of his lower back. He winced in response, but said nothing, relieved that Seifer hadn't noticed the crack in his stoic expression as his exhausted body reminded him of the terrors of the previous night.

'_It still hurts like shit... ugh.'_

The pain had distracted him momentarily, and seemingly without his own doing, he suddenly found himself next to Seifer in a huge, circular, dimly lit hall with a long stair case leading to another floor. The room was bustling with other students that were handing their tickets to well dressed adults, some of whom Squall recognized as teachers, who wrote their names into registers of some kind. Confused, Squall followed the blond up the steps and to a nearby table, where Seifer surrendered their ball tickets, gave the man their names and was presented with two royal blue ribbons in return.

"Pin them somewhere on your shirt where they're easy to see, so you'll have no problems getting in and out of the ballroom," the elderly man behind the table advised, smiling kindly. "And do enjoy yourselves, boys."

Suddenly, Squall – who had been gazing around the room in astonishment – felt Seifer's large hand on the small of his back, ushering him towards him gently, but with determination. Almost skeptically, he watched how the muscular blond leaned into him and – with great care – pinned one of the ribbons to the collar of his black shirt.

"There you go," Seifer said with just a husk of a voice, his eyes fleetingly passing over Squall's face, before holding the brunette's gaze with abrupt intensity.

Squall couldn't help but waver once more. Even now, with everything else that was going on all around him, a single look from Seifer's piercing green eyes still managed to nearly knock the ground out from underneath him.

"Thanks," he muttered quickly, dropping his gaze. He really didn't wanna be caught staring at Seifer when all these people were able to watch them. He didn't even notice how the blond fastened the second ribbon to his own shirt.

"Let's go inside."

His head jerked up at the order, and he looked over his shoulder nervously.

_Inside_?

'_I thought we were already inside!'_

He didn't fully understand until Seifer carefully pushed him forward and through a set of wide open doors into a huge, dark ballroom that was lit only by glittering disco balls, constantly shifting spotlights and a whole web of small, sparkling lamps that reminded him of Christmas lights stretched far along the walls and the ceiling. There was a stage, with a live band playing some kind of pop song he had never heard before, a bar, a buffet and an ice statue in the shape of their school mascot, as well as a group of chairs and tables, and of course... a dance floor.

'_Holy shit.'_

His eyes were wide and fixed as he stared upon hundreds of students passing through the room, dancing and chatting and taking pictures of each other. It was almost too much for Squall to take in at one time. He had never been around so many people in his life. His pulse quickened, and for a very long, tempting moment, he seriously considered bolting from this place as fast as he fucking could.

'_I can't do this. This is nuts! Look at all these fucking people!'_

Squall flinched when a flash of bright light suddenly erupted before him, and a familiar female voice screamed in delight.

"Oh my goodness, there you are! Took you guys long enough!"

The brunette blinked, squinting against the painful white spots dancing in his vision. After a few seconds, his gaze steadied upon a slender, dark blonde female brandishing a camera like one would a weapon. She was dressed in a luminous yellow ball gown that looked as if it had been sown directly onto her body. She looked gorgeous, although he had never thought of her as anything else. Still, there was something breathtaking about seeing her with her hair woven into a delicate up-do and her eyes sparking with so much delight that they rivaled the glitter that had been rubbed tastefully onto her shoulders.

"Selphie," he said when he finally found his voice, tilting his head in a childish sort of awe. "You look... beautiful."

She blushed at his simple, yet genuine compliment and hurriedly flung her arms around him in a bear hug. "It's good to see you," she whispered, only for his ears to hear.

The brunette merely nodded.

"Look at you," she exclaimed loudly as she pulled away, looking from her co-worker to his date, who was eyeing her with a small smirk on his face. "You guys look _stunning_! I can't believe you clean up this well! You've gotta be the hottest guys in here!"

"Hey, now, are you trying to make me jealous?" came a baritone voice with a playful lilt from somewhere behind Squall and Seifer, and they both felt someone whacking them on the back playfully. The boys turned, finding Irvine in tailored black slacks, boots, a tight fitting crisp white shirt and a black cowboy hat that he wore tilted at a jaunty angle. Quickly, he stepped up to his beautiful date to wrap his arm around her tiny waist possessively.

"Good to see you guys," the cowboy remarked, looking the new arrivals over appreciatively. "Glad you made it."

"Good to see you, too. That's a pretty lady you got there, Kinneas," Seifer said with an appreciative grin in Selphie's direction. "I told you yellow was just your color. These other chicks here have nothing on you."

"Oh, stop," she laughed, sticking out her tongue. "Ohh, hey, you guys want anything to drink?"

"Do they have booze?" Seifer asked, looking excited.

She rolled her eyes at the blond, huffing, "No! Of course not!", which he only accredited with a disgruntled sigh.

"Honestly, Seifer! This is a _school_ dance! Just hold on, I'll get you something. They have punch. It's pretty decent. I'll be right back," she announced, laughing at the disappointed look on Seifer's face. "Wait here!"

While Seifer contemplated finding someone to spike the punch or do the deed himself, Squall watched Selphie leaving and disappearing among the crowd, Irvine on her tail, taking a bit of his confidence with her. Admittedly, the sight of her had put him at least slightly more at ease. She wasn't just a familiar face; she was one of the very few people he actually felt comfortable around.

He was rubbing his upper arm with one hand, caught once more within the constantly moving walls of his own mind, when he felt someone bumping into his shoulder, brushing past in a way that caught his attention. His light blue eyes found a diminutive, chestnut haired female in a long, lean, Roman style white dress. He knew who she was, even before she had turned her head over her shoulder to look him dead in the eye.

'_... Rinoa.'_

Squall had difficulty gauging the expression on her face. She didn't look surprised to see him, although he figured that she probably should have been. After all, she had asked him to be her date on numerous occasions in the past, and he had always refused, telling her that he hated school dances and was never going to go to one. He hadn't even lied to her then, but of course, he realized that he had to look like a bit of an asshole now. Thus, he would have easily categorized the icy glare in her eyes as contempt, but there was something else there he didn't understand.

'_What the hell... She looks almost... pleased? I don't get it. This is weird.'_

Unwilling to read her any further, he simply turned his head aside.

"Hey," he heard Seifer murmuring somewhere by his left, much closer than he had remembered him to be. Instinctively, Squall flinched. "You okay?"

Squall regarded the tall blond with skittish mistrust, and he noticed that Seifer's green eyes drifted from him to Rinoa, who was blatantly looking the two of them up and down. There was suspicion to the blond's face, although he seemed to be trying to hide it. Seifer's arm was touching his, and even though the bodily contact would have looked accidental to most, Squall still took a half step back.

"I'm fine," he replied mechanically. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw that Rinoa had disappeared. Heaving a gritty sigh, he shook his head.

"What's the matter?" Seifer continued to pry, surveying Squall's guarded pose. "You look all tense."

"Nothing. I'm fine."

"Does it have anything to do with _her_?" the blond asked, obviously referring to Rinoa, and there was a coloring to his voice that Squall didn't like.

"No," the brunette snapped, irritated. He figured that if anyone had reason to be upset over Rinoa Heartilly's presence, it certainly _wasn't_ Seifer. After all, _Squall _ hadn't been the one who had paraded around the playground with her, acting like some stupid, love-struck little couple. Ignoring his own bout of jealousy, he rammed his hands into his pockets.

'_If he'd rather hang out with her, he can just get on with it. I don't give a shit.'_

Seifer, meanwhile, seemed to misinterpret the upset look on Squall's face in every possible way. He suddenly remembered Irvine telling him that Rinoa used to be quite interested in Squall, and the notion made him wonder.

Perhaps the attraction _was_ mutual, after all? What if there was more to his past with the dark haired girl than Squall had let on? Perhaps, on some off chance, Rinoa had something to do with Squall's absurd behavior, and his constant fear of being close to anyone?

'_They __**must**__ have some kind of history. They act weird around each other. She's a bimbo, alright, but she __**is**__ pretty damn hot. What if he liked her when they were in their freshman year, and she broke his heart? What if his behavior never had anything to do with some guy at all?'_

"This is weird to me," Squall finally pressed, interrupting Seifer's thought process. "I don't like being around all these people."

"Just relax," the blond attempted to reassure him, studying every miniscule movement of Squall's body. "We're here to have fun."

"This isn't my idea of fun."

"I understand. But at least give it a try."

'_Isn't that what I'm already doing? I'm here, aren't I? I'm __**trying**__.'_

Instead of voicing his opinion, Squall chose to remain silent. There was a part of him that wanted to please Seifer and pay him back for all the kindness he had shown him, but somehow, this didn't seem like the right occasion. He had never felt more out of place. He wanted to be somewhere else, on his own, even though the silence of solitude was sometimes harder to endure than the chatter of a thousand people.

'_I'd rather be at the park, or at Cosmo Canyon, or in the mountains, or at Seifer's apartment... I'd rather be anywhere but here.'_

He massaged the bridge of his nose, trying to ease that throbbing headache that just continued to pound behind his forehead. To his relief, the lights in the ballroom suddenly dimmed, and then he realized that the music had changed to something infinitely softer than the upbeat melodies that had preceded it.

"Hey. Look, over there," Seifer said, an amused drawl to his attractive voice. "Selphie and Irvine."

Curious, Squall followed the direction of Seifer's hand, which was pointing towards the dance floor. After an initial moment of confusion, he found Irvine and Selphie slow dancing towards the edge of the crowd in a tight, intimate embrace. The girl was resting her head against Irvine's shoulder, the concept of drinks apparently forgotten.

'_I honestly don't know why she wanted to get us drinks so badly to begin with. Guess she can't shake off the waitress in her. Hmm... I guess she really does look happy with Irvine. I'm... kinda glad.'_

The brunette continued to watch them, fascinated by the complexity of emotions he could see on both of their faces. They made a beautiful couple, and the affection between them was suddenly so obvious that he couldn't believe he had never noticed it before. Irvine had always struck him as an empty-headed playboy who considered flirting as something of a pastime, but tonight, everything about him seemed different. The feelings that were written in the lines of his face when he tenderly traced the curve of Selphie's spine with his hand seemed as real as the ones that were glowing in her emerald green eyes when she looked up and lightly tilted her head back to kiss him.

Something struck Squall then – something he believed he should've understood a long time ago.

'_**This**__ is what love is supposed to be like. A guy and a girl, being gentle and kind towards each other, showing their affection in public... not even seeing anything or anyone else around them. Totally consumed with each other and dreams of marriage and children and happiness for the rest of their lives, without mistrust and secrecy and cheating and abuse. My mother and Kato aren't like this. Maybe they were, at some point, but they're not anymore. And... neither are...'_

"... We're not like them."

Seifer had barely heard the boy's whisper, but he had become attuned to Squall's voice a while ago, listening for every fine nuance in his inflection and every shift in his breathing. Looking back and forth between the dancing couple and Squall's rigid, emotionless face, he was trying to understand the brunette's thought process, but he wasn't so sure he could comprehend even half of Squall's emotional range.

Shaking his head, he said, "What do you mean, 'we're not like them'? Who says we _have_ to be like them?"

Squall bit his lip and said nothing, feeling his eyes stinging for no particular reason. He was almost glad when the music finally changed to something more cheerful.

That was, until...

"Squall. Dance with me."

His head jerked around, staring at Seifer as if the blond had just offered him his nuts with a side of fries. The older teen stood facing him, one large hand extended towards him in a mute kind of invitation, and although the smile on Seifer's lips seemed sincere, the whole image caused Squall to drop his jaw in revolt. He looked truly mortified.

"What are you doing?" he hissed under his breath, glancing around anxiously to see if anyone had noticed Seifer's strange behavior. "Stop that!"

"Why?" the blond responded, entirely unimpressed as he motioned Squall towards him once more. "Come on, dance with me!"

"Are you crazy?" the brunette snapped back, sounding almost hysterical. "I am _not_ going to dance with you!"

"Why the hell not? You _are_ my date, you know, in case you've forgotten."

"This isn't an ordinary date!"

"Well, of course it isn't," Seifer agreed smugly. "Which is why I insist you dance with me. C'mon, it's not a slow dance, so what's the big deal?"

"I'm a _guy_, in case that little fact has slipped your fucking mind!" Squall hissed acidly. "I don't wanna dance with you! Go find some girl to dance with!"

"I don't wanna dance with some girl. I wanna dance with _you_."

"You're completely cracked in the head!"

"Seriously, what's the big deal, Squall?" Seifer asked exasperatedly, performing a sweeping gesture towards the dance floor. "Take a look around. There's other guys dancing together."

"That's not the same thing!"

"How so?"

"Fuck it! It doesn't matter!" Squall spat, raising his hands angrily. Seifer saw the anger burning in his eyes, but he didn't understand. "I'm not doing this! This is bullshit!"

Grunting, Seifer reached out to grab a hold of Squall's arm, and he pulled the staggering brunette closer by the elbow. In a deliberately light, playful voice he purred, "Don't be so stubborn, princess. Come on, lemme have this dance!"

Frustrated, Squall yanked his arm back and shouted, "Don't touch me!"

Finally, the blond caught on to the gravity of the situation, and his face twisted into a frown. He made no second attempt at grabbing his friend, but his expression suggested that he would've liked nothing more. Clicking his tongue, he asked, "Squall, what in the hell are you freaking out about? Seriously, everybody probably already thinks we're gay anyway, so what's with the drama?"

"It's always so _fucking_ easy for you, isn't it?"

"Oh, well, let's see... I like you, you like me. End of story," Seifer said in a cynical tone. "I don't see what's supposedly so complicated about it."

Squall snorted and jerked his head to the side, his volatile temper in full control of him at last.

"Fucking figures."

With that, he whipped around and stalked towards the door, a storm of emotions raging inside of him that he could no longer hold at bay. His heart felt tight and hollow as he ran down the stairs, trying not to fall in his hurried escape, wishing that he had never set foot inside this place.

'_I should've known better. I should've __**known**__. I'm such a fucking idiot!'_

Just as he had made it through the exit and onto the sidewalk, rudely pushing people aside to clear himself a path, he felt someone clutching his arm and yanking him around. He knew that touch; it was the only male's hand he had ever willingly permitted on himself.

Right now, however, Seifer was only making things worse.

"What are you—"

"Shut up!"

The words caught in his throat as he noted the resentment on Seifer's face when the blond turned around and dragged him down the sidewalk, away from the crowds and towards a small group of trees. Squall struggled against the forceful hold, but he didn't fight back as hard as he could have. All in all, he wasn't even sure if he was upset, or just unimaginably confused. The overt display of emotions on Seifer's features scared him, partly because he didn't want anyone else to see them.

Seifer, on the other hand, seemed entirely apathetic to the idea of the whole _school _finding out about their twisted little love story.

When they had reached the trees, which offered them at least a marginal amount of privacy, Seifer thrust Squall away from himself, although he cleared the distance between them again almost immediately. Squall ricocheted back, hitting the trunk of the nearest tree, watching Seifer with the same raw, fearful intensity that a bit of prey would watch a fast approaching predator.

He didn't know what to expect next.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" Seifer finally barked, his breath coming in sharp, angry gulps of air. "What the _fuck_ is your deal?"

After he had caught himself at least slightly, Squall opened his mouth to protest.

"Nothing! I—"

"No, shut up! Cut the fuckin' shit, okay? I've had enough of it, you understand? Stop having a fuckin' freak-out in your mind and just _tell me_ what's wrong with you!"

Squall closed his mouth, startled. He hadn't seen Seifer this pissed off since that day he had lied to him on the staircase at his house, about the things in life he was afraid of. Back then, too, just as much as today, he had felt that the other male's backlash had been entirely uncalled for. By God, he was _trying – _he was trying so hard to be like other, normal teenagers, to allow himself to trust and to let someone into his fiercely guarded heart, but he couldn't just tear down walls that he had sustained for _years_, and neither could Seifer. It was hurting him to see his desperate efforts belittled like this; the emotional and physical punishment he dealt with on a daily basis, only for some small scrap of happiness, were apparently worth _nothing._

This was so goddamn unfair.

"Why..." he finally choked, his eyes dancing with tears he would never spill in front of a crowd of people. "Why is nothing ever good enough for you? Why do you always want more?"

"That's not the point, Squall," Seifer growled, missing the significance of the dark haired boy's words. "The point is that I can never make heads or tails of half the shit that's going on with you, just because you never tell me what the fuck is bothering you!"

"I told you, I just... I don't want people to know, I—"

"_Fuck_ people, okay? Fuck them! What do they matter?"

"They matter to _me_," Squall insisted.

"When has anyone _ever_ mattered to you?" Seifer spat coldly, knowing full well that he was striking a nerve. Squall looked shocked, and Seifer could tell that on the inside, he was withdrawing himself even further. He wanted to stop it from happening; he wanted to pull the brunette so goddamn close that nothing and nobody could ever come between them, but perhaps it was already too late for that. No matter how hard he tried, Squall never seemed to fully trust him or accept his affection as something that might actually be real. It was as if the brunette almost _wanted_ him to fuck him over.

He was so fucking sick of it.

"What is wrong with you, Squall?" he asked again, sounding almost resentful.

"Nothing," Squall insisted stubbornly, reclining further against the tree, away from Seifer.

"You're lying to me," the blond growled. "You're fuckin' lying to me and I _fuckin_' hate it."

"Why the hell does there have to be anything wrong with me, just because I don't wanna run around and tell everyone about us?" Squall snapped, his own patience running thin.

"That's not it. You wanna _hide_ the fact that you're gay. You're fuckin' paranoid about it. Why?"

"I'm _not_ gay!" Squall retorted angrily, too fast for his own mind to reconsider. It had been a stupid thing to say, perhaps, considering that he knew full well how attracted he was to the blond and how that alone should've clued him in on his own sexuality, but his romantic interest in Seifer was nothing he wanted to put a label on. Squall could've been called so many different things – a cutter, a rape victim, a complete psychological train wreck – but he didn't want these pieces of him to define him in any way. Declaring himself as 'gay' had never been part of the plan. Obviously, Seifer felt very different about the situation, and the sudden coldness in the blond's green eyes made Squall wince.

"Oh, really now?" the older boy snorted, narrowing his eyes. "Is that how it is? Funny you'd say that. Well, I'm not gay either, but you can bet your uptight little ass that I'd happily bend you over and fuck your brains out any day of the week. Call it whatever the fuck you want, you know, but that's the way it is, princess."

"Shut up! Don't say shit like that!" Squall cringed, painfully aware of how easily they could be overheard. Seifer seemed to be willfully pushing the boundaries of their relationship, as if he was determined to drive Squall into a corner.

"And _this_ is why I think that something is wrong with you," Seifer explained evenly, his tone cunning. "You are so fuckin' frightened of me and of taking all of this to a different level. Why is that? What do you think I'm possibly gonna do to you? I mean, be honest, have you ever even _thought_ about having sex with me?"

He glared provocatively at the brunette, who gave him an empty stare out of sharp, gleaming grey eyes, squirming for a long time until he finally dropped his gaze and quietly shook his head.

It felt like a punch in Seifer's stomach.

"... I should've known."

Squall's face was twisting, and he had started to rub his leather-bound wrists. He looked more lost than Seifer had ever seen him, but the sight inspired no gentleness from him right now.

"... Who is Aren?"

Squall's eyebrows raised at the sudden and unexpected question, and he stunned back as far as the tree behind him would permit. Jerkily, he answered, "W-What? Why... I already told you. Why are you asking me that?"

"No, you lied to me back then," Seifer stated coldly. "Who is he _really_? Does he even _exist_?"

"I..."

Squall paused, simply staring at the blond in disbelief. He couldn't comprehend any of this. How had Seifer figured out so much on his own, in such a short period of time? Or was he just playing guessing games here? And when had this evening, which had started out in such a promising way, turned into such a hell of a nightmare?

"Tell me, Squall," Seifer urged, a nasty inflection to his normally kind voice. "Did you really fuck him, or was that just another one of your bullshit little stories?"

Wearily, Squall turned his head aside. "Stop..." he murmured, his voice breaking. "Just stop."

"No, _you_ stop! Stop lying to me and tell me the fuckin' truth, for _once_!" Seifer roared angrily, no longer caring whether he hurt Squall's feelings. "I'm sick of your bullshit, you hear me, you lying little fuck! _Why_ are you like this? Who is this _Aren_? I know he wasn't some high school senior you dated, so who is he _really_? Did _he _do this to you, or did someone else fuck your little world up like this, huh? What is your fuckin' _deal_, Squall? Why in the _hell_ are you so completely _fucked _in the head?"

Squall stared back at him, the hurt in his expression overshadowed only by a strange kind of resignation. He had never looked more destroyed or helpless.

Seifer, however, wasn't willing to acknowledge any of this.

"C'mon, spill it," the blond challenged with a hiss. "Spill your fuckin' guts, princess. I'm tired of your psycho bullshit. What is going on in that crazy little head of yours?"

"It's... none of your business," Squall pressed, the words brittle and hollow, his eyes dancing with agony as he soaked up Seifer's pointless rage. "This is my life. And my life... is none of your business. It never had _anything_ to do with you. You're nobody. You're... nothing. You're just someone I'll forget about before the year's over. You mean... nothing to me. I don't want you near me. I never did. This whole thing was never anything. Stay away from me. Just... stay_ the fuck _away."

He knew that his callous, cruel response would only continue to shove his and Seifer's relationship further along this downward spiral, but in his current position, he figured that it no longer made a difference. As much as it pained Squall to admit it, Seifer was right - he'd never truly been honest with the blond this whole time. It was too late now to tell the truth, and it was definitely too late to apologize for all the lies he had told. At this point, he could only cut both of their losses, before they would drown each other in a relationship so burdened with dishonesty that it would eventually suffocate both of them. In the end, Squall couldn't handle the idea of causing any more damage than he had already done.

Their relationship had been over before it had ever truly begun.

Seifer, too, seemed to realize this, because his handsome features suddenly set, and his eyes became hard and distant.

"You're right," he said, stone faced, and the chill in his voice felt like a million daggers in Squall's heart. "You're absolutely right. I don't know why the fuck I ever bothered in the first place."

When he turned around and slowly walked back towards the building, something inside Squall seemed to collapse. He opened his mouth, wanting to say something, _anything _of significance that would hold Seifer back, but instead, he closed his lips once more and quietly dropped his head.

'_This is... hopeless.'_

Groaning, he covered his face with his right hand and leaned with his back against the tree. Even through his splayed fingers, he could see the white stars hanging in the ink black night sky, and he wanted to scream so loud that any form of life out there in the universe would be able to hear him. But instead, he remained silent, bottling up his hurt and guilt amongst all the other emotions that he could neither comprehend nor show.

He had never felt so alone.

* * *

Okay, this chapter turned out quite a bit different than I had originally planned. First of all, there are two parts to this. This is part I, part II will follow soon. Originally, I had planned on releasing everything as one large chapter, but it was just getting too long to be feasible. There was way too much going on. At 20,000 words, I decided I needed to restructure this a little, so I did. This always seemed like a natural break in the chapter to me, so I went with this. I'll try and get the next part done as soon as I can. Until then, please enjoy.


	28. Where Are You Tonight, Part 2

-:-  
**Chapter 28  
****Where Are You Tonight – Part 2**

"_What have I done?"  
_-:-

There's a lion in the road

There's a demon escaped

There's a million dreams gone

There's a landscape being raped

As her beauty fades and I watch her undrape

I won't, but then again, maybe I might

Oh, if I could just find you tonight.

"_Where Are You Tonight" – Bob Dylan_

-:-

He was a motionless shadow by the side of the road, waiting as the minutes dragged on and he watched through half-shuttered eyes how other students were filing out of the building and leaving with much laughter in their cars or limousines. Some would turn their heads to stare at him with curiosity, but for the most part, nobody seemed to realize that he was even there. Squall had entered the City Hall earlier, if only briefly, looking for Seifer without a tangible idea of what to say. He didn't feel that he had anything to apologize for, but he also hadn't wanted to ruin their relationship, no matter what he had said only minutes before. His face was burning when he thought about the lies he had told in the past weeks and months and _years_, and he despised himself for his own dishonesty. Of course, he knew that Seifer's anger was justified, but he figured that he had only lied for the good of his family, and never for his own benefit. He had been enduring so much, for so long, yet it felt like none of his efforts were considered worthwhile.

Not by Seifer, anyhow.

Squall was trembling without his own volition when he remembered finding Zell in the ballroom earlier. The quirky, spiky haired blond had informed him that Selphie and Irvine were worried and looking for him, and that Seifer had already left. Squall had lingered no longer after that. He had called his mother from his cell phone in a jerky voice, asking her to come and pick him up, and then he had returned outside, only to be alone with his thoughts and his lingering guilt.

Squall didn't know how long he had been waiting, but he was glad when his mother's van finally pulled up beside him. Without wasting any more time, he jumped into the passenger seat and slammed the door shut. He said nothing to his mother, who was looking at him vigilantly from the side, before taking off towards the freeway without a question or a word.

Raine continued to watch him in silence, her cobalt eyes full of concern when she darted quick looks between the road and Squall's tight, ashen face. He looked pale and exhausted, and the happiness he had emanated in Seifer's presence only hours before seemed to have faded entirely. She had seen her son sad and upset many times over the years, but this was the most brokenhearted he had ever looked in his entire life.

Finally, she cleared her throat.

He had wallowed in his own misery long enough - it was time to make him talk.

"Squall... what happened tonight?"

He ran his hand along the seatbelt in his lap, ignoring the question for a moment as he fidgeted around. Finally, he mumbled evasively, "Nothing."

She paused for a moment, analyzing the frown on his face, before she asked, "... Where is Seifer?"

He shook his head, almost unwilling to answer, before he stated reluctantly and with a deadpan expression, "He went home early."

"Did you two get into a fight?" she inquired carefully.

"No."

She sighed at her son's stubbornness, surprised that he would honestly believe she wouldn't see through his desperate act. Squall was wise beyond his seventeen years, and yet, in many aspects, he was still nothing more than a child – helpless and inexperienced when faced with emotional hardships his young mind couldn't even begin to comprehend.

It was easy to misjudge just how innocent and naive he really was.

"Squall, he wouldn't have left you at the dance unless something had happened," she explained, not even a shadow of doubt in her clear, melodious voice.

He wondered at the affirmation in her tone, and his eyes narrowed when he looked back at her warily.

"What do you mean?"

She smiled forgivingly at him and gently shook her head.

Could he really be this oblivious?

"Honestly, Squall, that boy is completely infatuated with you," she said with a sigh, and the stark, unmasked reality of her words caught him completely off guard.

As Squall's jaw went slack, his stomach seemed to drop.

"W-what?" he stammered, inching back in his seat. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't be silly, love," she chided, scowling at him slightly. "Did you really think I hadn't noticed?"

"I... No, I... Mom, I swear, it's not like that... I..."

"Squall, I realized what was going on between you two a _while_ ago, maybe even the first day I met him," she continued stoically, ignoring his feeble protests. "That boy, Seifer... he's so loud and almost a bit too cocky, but whenever he's around you, he just _stares_ at you with these big, green eyes, as if all he ever wanted was to know how to make you happy."

"It... no, I... I'm not... we're not..."

As he tried to make pointless excuses to disguise a truth she had found out long before he had, Raine merely smiled at him with the infinite patience of a mother that wanted nothing more than to see her child content and all of his wishes fulfilled, no matter what it took or how unreasonable the boy thought his desires had to be.

"Squall, it's okay. It's honestly _okay_," she promised, her eyes burning into his with heartfelt truth and intensity. "I want you to be happy. I want you to feel what it's like to be in love. I was in love when I was your age - so very, _very_ much in love – and I want nothing more than for you to experience those same feelings. I've been so worried about you these past years, did you know that? You always seemed so... unhappy. Even when you would smile, it never seemed quite right. But since Seifer came along you've really changed, and I am _so _thankful for that! Do you really think it matters to me whether he's a boy or a girl? He makes you _smile_, Squall. Everything else is irrelevant. You don't have anything to worry about, okay? It's alright. It really is."

Finally, it fully struck Squall how stupid he had been for keeping his budding relationship with the blond a secret from his mother. He had hurt Seifer's feelings, only because he had wanted to keep their affection from someone who had figured it out a long time ago, and who seemed to want nothing more than to see him happy. Years of emotional, physical and sexual abuse had obviously skewed his impression of people, especially those closest to him.

He felt like such an idiot.

"You're not upset...?" he asked hesitantly, searching her eyes.

Granted, this had never been _just_ about her approval – his mother was not the one he had worried might punish him for being attracted to Seifer. He wasn't a complete moron, of course; he knew that she would always love him, no matter what he would do, but his fear of disappointing her had been greater than that of losing her love, which he had possessed even before the day he had been born.

"Of course not, silly boy," she declared resolutely. "You should know better than that."

Raine watched how he nodded slowly, insecurity still glowering in his light blue eyes that had always reminded her so much of his father's. Truly, Squall was the spitting image of her high school lover, and as the full magnitude of Squall's father's memory hit her, Raine's voice became grave.

"Squall, listen to me," she urged, taking a deep breath and stilling the intense memories in her heart before she continued. "If you love someone, really, _truly_ love them, and they love you back the very same way, then you can't listen to what other people tell you. _You_ define what happiness means to you – not society, not school, and not even me. This is your choice entirely, and nobody else's. Don't pass on someone just because you think your relationship might be frowned upon by others. Do what brings you joy. Do what brings you fulfillment. Don't worry about the rest – it will all work itself out. You've always been such a smart, prudent child, but this time, you need to follow your heart, and not your head," she said firmly, and he noticed a sudden spark in her eyes. "And you know... the only reason I'm upset right now is because you two got into an argument and now you're planning on going home without having it resolved."

Her son silently stared out of the front window, his hands constantly moving in his lap. He looked as if his whole understanding of the world had just been turned upside down.

It was a lot for a seventeen year old to handle.

Finally, she decided to stop the van and looked her boy straight in the eye, as if she was searching his soul for answers that he himself could not find. She saw the confusion, the fright, and – most of all – the helplessness.

"Squall," she asked, gently placing her hand on his forearm. "How about I drop you off at his house so you guys can talk?"

He was eyeing her hesitantly, but he resisted his initial instinct to object. Finally, without thinking too much at all, he nodded his head.

"Yeah..." he said, his brows furrowed. "I guess I... have some apologies to make."

"Okay, honey. Where does he live?" she asked patiently, but without giving him too much time to reconsider his decision.

"I think it's 1050 Centennial Boulevard... Those new apartments near the museum."

"Okay, I'm pretty sure I know where that is. We'll be there in no time. Hang on."

And she was right, because it seemed to him that mere seconds had passed before he suddenly found himself looking up through his window at the tall, well-kept buildings that were part of Seifer's apartment complex. He felt a sour, churning sensation in the pit of his stomach, which was mostly empty because he hadn't eaten a single thing since this morning. He figured that his mother must have sensed his uneasiness, because she looked at him with those soothing dark blue eyes of hers, smiling patiently.

"Don't worry. Everything's gonna be fine."

He wished that he had even half of her confidence. She had always been fiercely optimistic, even in the face of a crisis that would've easily driven other people into despair.

Quickly, he shook off the memory of that tragedy from three years ago before it could overwhelm him.

'_Ell...'_

Shuddering, he looked back at his mother and said, "Mom, listen... don't tell Kato that... that Seifer and I..."

Something in her face changed. He could see it, and he knew that he shouldn't blame her, but she needed to realize that the trust he felt towards her did not extend towards her husband.

"Squall," she started, sounding hesitant, "Honey, I'm sure that—"

"Mom, no," he interrupted her, shaking his head in a gesture of defiance. "I don't want him to know. Not yet. Please, don't tell him."

"Well, okay, but—"

"Please, _promise me_ you won't tell him!"

She picked up on the rare urgency in his voice, and it ultimately quieted her objections. Raine wasn't certain _why _her son was so deeply afraid of his stepfather finding out his romantic secret, but she loved him too much to not respect his wishes, however confusing they seemed to her at this time. Perhaps, she figured, it would simply take more time for Squall to become comfortable with the thought of making his sexuality and his budding relationship with Seifer public.

Either way, she finally nodded in affirmation.

"I promise, love. I won't tell him. You have my word."

He smiled at her, looking eternally grateful. Something about the relief she saw in his eyes caused the concerns on her mind to flare once more, but he had jumped out of the car before she could have voiced any of them.

"Thanks for everything, Mom," he said with newfound energy, and she couldn't believe how grown-up and good looking he was, standing there in his brand new evening attire, all tall and dark and handsome, looking every bit of a heartbreaker, yet never acting the part. It seemed as if it had been only yesterday that he had been a little boy, cradled in her arms in the middle of the night because he had been scared of the monsters in his closet.

Finally, she sighed.

Her baby had grown up a long time ago.

"Good night, darling. Call me if you need me to come and pick you up, okay?"

"Yeah," he replied, waving casually. "Night."

And with that, he threw the car door shut and swung around to head straight for the apartment building, almost as if he was afraid that he might change his mind if he dared to hesitate just another minute. She lingered for a while longer, watching him disappearing out of sight, before she decided that his was a battle he had to fight and win entirely on his own.

"... Good luck, sweetheart."

When she drove off with those last, softly muttered well-wishes, she didn't know that her son had already climbed the stairs to Seifer's apartment with great determination, only to stop in front of the blond's door in a sudden fit of uncertainty. He hadn't paid attention down in the parking lot to see if he could spot Seifer's truck anywhere, and he hadn't even considered that the blond might still be out, roaming the town.

'_Fuck. He might not even be home.'_

After that initial onset of hesitation, Squall eventually mustered the courage to perform a faint knock on Seifer's door, if only because he didn't know what else to do. He waited several long moments, but heard nothing, and nobody came to the door.

'_Shiva's not even barking. What if he went to bed? Maybe I should just go home. It's pretty late...'_

Uneasy, Squall looked around. He stuck both of his hands into his pockets, stepping from one foot to the other while he pondered his next course of action, when his body suddenly went still.

'_Damn... of course!'_

With a gleam in his eyes, he extricated his right hand, which was clutching a small, silver ring with four keys attached to it. One belonged to his house, one to his bike, one to Ward's Diner, and one...

He fumbled with the last key, staring at the brand new, shiny piece of metal. Then, his gaze drifted to Seifer's door.

'_He said I could use it. That's why he gave it to me. Still... maybe I shouldn't... What if he doesn't wanna see me? He was really mad. Ugh... Damn. I can't just leave without apologizing. He may never wanna talk to me again if I don't.'_

He fidgeted for a while longer, removing the key from the ring to turn it in his hand over and over again. The thought of entering someone else's house unannounced didn't sit right with him. Thus, for the second time, he knocked his knuckles against the wood of Seifer's front door, more demandingly this time.

The effect, however, was the same.

'_Damn... What am I supposed to do? If he's asleep, I might wake him up. But what if he's gone? I guess I could go in and leave a note or something. Or I could hang out until he comes back. Uh, no, scratch that - that might freak him out. He __**did**__ say I could come by whenever I want to, but... that was before I pissed him off.'_

As he rubbed the mussed of back of his head, he could feel that knot in the pit of his stomach coiling a bit tighter at the reminiscence of their nasty argument at the school ball. Admittedly, even Squall, the constant cynic, had pictured the evening to end on a different note. Of course, he hadn't expected Seifer to confront him about his invented ex-boyfriend, nor that he would insist so stubbornly on making their relationship public.

'_It's not even like he's my boyfriend or anything... but I guess... I kind of get it.'_

He let out a small groan and pinched the back of his nose.

'_Fuck it.'_

There was a sudden burst of determination that fueled his movements when he stepped forward and jammed his key into Seifer's lock, his face tense with concentration. Squall deliberately tried to keep his fear-riddled mind from focusing too much onto what exactly he was doing when he turned the key and gently opened the door.

He was holding his breath as he stepped inside, not even entirely sure why. Immediately, he noticed that all of the lights were out. It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness, which was only lifted by the moonlight streaking through the shuttered windows. To his surprise, Squall realized that Shiva was sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, her large, furry, black and white figure motionless as a statue, staring back at him out of strange, piercing blue eyes.

Squall opened his mouth to greet her, but his attention was disrupted by a sudden noise coming from the direction of Seifer's bedroom.

Slowly, the boy took a step forward and turned towards the bedroom door, which had been propped open a few inches wide. He tilted his head in curiosity when he heard another faint moan and noticed something moving on Seifer's bed, but when he finally realized what he was seeing, his body went still.

Out of wide, disbelieving eyes that were the same startling color as Shiva's, Squall stared upon the image of a slender, half naked brunette female being lowered onto the mattress of Seifer's bed by a pair of long, tan, heavily muscled arms. Something was thumping in the back of Squall's head as he stood there, unable to turn his gaze away from a sight so shocking that it caused every muscle in his body to tense. He was paralyzed, rendered immobile by something he had never in his entire life and in all of his naivety imagined he would see. He knew the girl, whose chest was bare and glowing ivory in the moonlight, framed by long tresses of chestnut colored hair that fell gracefully across her shoulders. She was none other than Rinoa Heartilly, and the guy kissing his way down her collarbone was the only male that Squall had ever trusted.

Something dislodged inside of him that moment as the hairs on the back of his neck stood, and he reeled around towards the kitchen, feeling sick. Shock and incredulity had initially petrified every last one of his limbs, but those feelings had quickly turned into nausea and revolt. Cold sweat was now covering his skin as his heart started to race and his stomach coiled into a tight knot. Squall's feet were hastily carrying him towards the counter, and as everything within his body threatened to erupt in a maelstrom of hurt, his shaking hand quietly placed his key next to Seifer's phone. His world was tilting as he fled from Seifer's apartment and into a darkness that swallowed him whole, mimicking the black, violent, shapeless emotions that had seized control of him.

Meanwhile, the moment Squall had set foot on the stairs outside, nearly falling down the steps as he ran, Shiva let out a series of high-pitched, wounded barks. Even Seifer, who had been engrossed in the unholy bliss of savoring the nearly undressed female body laid out before him, could sense the urgency in his dog's cry and froze mid-movement.

"What the hell...?"

Puzzled, he motioned for Rinoa to stay put as he himself climbed off the bed and off of her to move into the living room. Dressed only in slacks and nothing else, he made a few cautious steps across the carpet, halting only when he realized that his front door was wide open.

"What the _fuck_..."

There was a strange sense of premonition that fell over him as he slowly walked into the kitchen, where Shiva was perched by the counter, looking back at him. Perhaps he should've expected a burglar or sensed danger of another kind, but for some reason, Seifer knew better than that. Unsure, he looked over at his dog, and when his gaze haphazardly grazed over the top of the kitchen counter, all color finally drained from Seifer's face.

"... Oh, my God."

He could hear Rinoa moving in his bedroom, calling out for him in confusion.

"Seifer, what's the matter?"

"Stay there!" he ordered, his voice strident and panicked, his gaze still glued to the key on that counter.

He knew what he was seeing, but he didn't fully understand the impact of what he had just done until his eyes cut towards the open front door once more.

Suddenly, his own stupidity hit him like a hammer in the face.

"Oh fuck. Fuck. _Fuck_!"

Then, he ran. He ran out of his apartment, down the stairs and into the wide, nearly empty parking lot. His green eyes were moving quickly left and right, searching his surroundings, until he found the disappearing shadow of a slim figure that was nearing the gates of his apartment complex.

"Squall!" he shouted at the top of his lungs, completely unaware of his environment and the quickly advancing nighttime. "Squall, wait! _Squall_!"

Seifer noticed the black-clad male figure pausing, before he continued to walk away at the same, stoic pace. Horrified, Seifer dashed after him in a full out sprint, his naked feet cutting across the pavement. He was closing in on the brunette fast, but nevertheless, he continued to yell.

"Squall, wait! _Wait_!"

But Squall kept walking until the blond had eventually caught up with him. Knowing no better at this point, Seifer reached out and hurriedly grabbed a hold of the dark haired boy's shoulder, spinning him around.

Seifer had been prepared to find the boy looking angry, or even hurt, but he hadn't expected to find a smile on Squall's face, as lifeless and false as the eyelashes that Rinoa had been wearing glued to her pale white lids tonight. Squall's eyes were dilated and dark, holding a strange shadow of resignation that Seifer had never seen on him before.

'_What have I done...'_

Panting and pale with worry, Seifer grimaced at his opposite, a sudden helplessness pouring into his voice as he opened his mouth to speak.

"Squall... Squall, I—"

"Oh, Seifer, hey," the brunette interrupted, his pitch tight and hollow. The words sounded mechanic and wrong to Seifer's ears, even more so when he saw the painful flash in Squall's unnaturally wide eyes.

"Squall..." he winced, feeling sick to his stomach.

"What are you doing out here?" Squall asked, his tone forced and cheerful. There was something very broken hidden behind that hastily thrown up barricade of nonchalance. "Hey... you're not even wearing any shoes. Go back inside, dumbass. You'll catch a cold."

"Squall," the blond started again, his gaze fixed upon Squall feverishly, as if he expected him to blow up into a million pieces. "Squall, please, I... I... I know what you saw, and I... I don't know what to say, I..."

"What do you mean?" Squall asked, keeping his voice light despite the painful burning in his throat. Through some perverse kind of miracle, he managed not to cry or punch Seifer square in the face, and the smile never slipped from his lips. "You don't have to say anything. You did nothing wrong. It's fine."

"No, no it's not! There's nothing 'fine' about it at all!" Seifer objected resolutely, shaking his head. He was so sickened by his own actions, he thought he'd have to vomit.

Squall, however, only shrugged.

"Seriously, don't worry about it," the brunette insisted. His pale body looked so beautiful and so breakable in the moonlight that Seifer wanted to kill himself for what he had done.

"But—"

"Seifer, I get it, okay? You're a guy, and she's a girl, it's perfectly normal," Squall lectured, believing his own words as much as he believed that the earth was flat. Still, his own self-preservation mechanisms forced him to stay unnaturally calm, when all he really wanted was to lash out at Seifer for making him believe, if just for a little while, that he could allow himself to trust someone else without being fucked over.

"No, Squall! No, you—"

"Listen..." the brunette cut in, something in his face slipping minutely. "Just go back, okay? I'm sure she's waiting for you."

"No, don't, just listen to me, I—"

"No," Squall said, shaking his head in acquiescence. "I should go home. I didn't mean to ruin your night. I'm sorry."

"What? You haven't ruined _anything_!" Seifer yelped desperately, slapping his own forehead with his closed right fist. "This is all my fault, I... fuck... Oh my God, I'm such a fuck up..."

The brunette, however, continued to smile bizarrely and performed another jerky shrug. "It's okay. Really."

"Squall..."

Pleading, Seifer stared at the one person in his life he had never wanted to disappoint. For the first time, he saw Squall for who he really was – a vulnerable human being, capable of hurting in so many ways, who had placed his fragile trust into him and granted him a glimpse into his guarded heart that he had buried for so long beneath an exterior of bitterness and suspicion and the most distant of attitudes. But instead of cherishing and protecting him as he should have, Seifer had trampled on his feelings as if they had never meant anything at all.

In the end, he hadn't measured up to being even half the man that Squall had managed to be all along.

'_I've done everything all wrong. I'm so fuckin' pathetic.'_

No matter how much he cared about the brunette, he knew exactly how his actions had to look – how much they had to hurt Squall. As he watched that disturbing smile that was so out of place on Squall's lips, Seifer wanted to reach out and hug the boy and beg him for forgiveness, but he forced himself not to, too scared to frighten the brunette into running away once more. Instead, he whispered, urgently, fighting with his own tears, "Squall, please... please stop smiling."

There was a crack in the boy's efforts, but he managed to keep it up, at least for now. Shaking his head, he responded lightly, "What are you talking about?"

"Squall, please... You're... you're killing yourself."

"Don't be ridiculous," Squall snorted, but Seifer now noticed a diamond sharp gleam in the boy's eyes. He was no longer blinking.

"Squall..."

"Geez, quit the pity party already," Squall attempted to joke, continuing to smile grotesquely. "It's honestly okay."

"No! No, it's not!" Seifer finally flared up. "There's nothing funny about this! It's _not_ okay! It's **not** fuckin' okay _at all!_"

The boy's fake grin stayed in place, but the gesture seemed to demand a lot of effort from him. Still, he somehow managed to chuckle. "I'm telling you, Seifer, it's totally fi—"

"_**STOP FUCKIN SMILING!**__"_

He had shouted this time, and Squall recoiled. Seifer saw the shock in his pale blue eyes, which looked so much redder in the moonlight now than they had only seconds before. At last, the bizarre smile on Squall's lips vanished. His features were twitching now, battling the cruel, painful emotions that really, truly raged beneath the surface of his beautiful flat affect.

"Shit, Squall... I... I'm sorry... I..."

Seifer's emerald eyes were flooding with wordless plea and a helplessness that the blond had never experienced before. For all his strength and all his cocky confidence, he felt so powerless that he thought it was going to drive him insane.

Across from him, Squall seemed unable to endure the situation any longer. The last bit of determination in his unwavering gaze was submitting to shadows of resignation at last, and Seifer could tell that he was losing him.

"I... have to go..." the brunette finally stammered faintly, lowering his head. Seifer could see his shoulders jerking.

"No, wait, please! Don't go!" he pleaded, still not daring to touch Squall. He was trying to reach the brunette with his words alone, and at that moment, he didn't even realize that he had never before begged for _anything_ in his entire life. "Please, I'm sorry for yelling at you, I'm sorry for _everything_... I'm such a dumbass, I... Please stay, please, I'm so fucking sorry, I—"

"I... can't..." the dark haired teenager responded arduously, wincing as he felt the gravity of his emotions hitting him full on. "I'm sorry."

Another broken, fleeting smile that had nothing to do with humor crossed Squall's lips when he finally turned away, his limbs moving stiffly like those of a doll. Seifer felt Squall's profound sadness as much as his very own, but he didn't know how to make any of it go away. He had made the worst mistake of his life, and there was nothing he could say to fix it. His hand reached out for the brunette, moved entirely by instinct, but it halted in mid-air. As much as he hated it, Seifer understood that no touch, no matter how strong or possessive, would be able to keep Squall from walking away from him. He knew that he had ruined their relationship through his despicable, selfish actions, but if there had been any way for him to undo the damage he had caused, by God, he would've done it, no matter the price.

"Squall... _fuck_... wait... please, _wait_... Don't go..."

And as Squall slowly walked out of his life without another word or glance, leaving behind a world of painful memories that neither of them could handle, Seifer's mind finally reeled, and he erupted in tears that he had never thought he would spill over the loss of another human being. He didn't get it at first - he had always been fine on his own, completely spoiled and self-centered, never caring for anyone or anything on a deeper level, and yet the sight of Squall leaving him was enough to break his heart. Seifer's very own understanding of the world came to a sudden halt that night as he stood there, sobbing like a child, realizing at last what had been happening to him all this time... and he finally wept the only words he had always been too afraid to say.

"Squall... please... _please_... I... I l-love you..."

There was a sudden jolt that went through Squall's mind, and his body went rigid. He stopped dead in his tracks as his heartbeat slowed to a shocked crawl and he soaked up the meaning of Seifer's heartfelt, hopeless confession.

The blond had been catapulted into a state of complete agony, and he was dissolving in tears, no matter how much he wished he could stop crying and tell Squall _clearly _how he felt... how he had been feeling all along. It seemed so wrong to say it now, after he had mistreated Squall so horribly, but he couldn't help the words that were just pouring out of him at last.

"I... I've never loved anyone in my entire, pathetic life... but goddamn, I love you Squall, I _love _you more than anything I've ever known... I don't want to lose you... I'm so fucking scared of losing you... I don't know what to do, I don't know how to keep you from walking away, but I'd do anything it takes, _anything_... please don't go, please, I love you so fucking much... I-I _can't_ take it..."

Finally, Squall turned around, staring at Seifer's quivering body and the tear stained face he was burying in his hands.

For a long time, words simply failed him.

"W-what?" the pale, dark haired boy finally whispered in a low, choked voice full of disbelief. "What did you say...?"

"I _love you_, Squall! _I love you_. I love you so much it breaks my fucking heart!" Seifer burst out, hiccoughing and dropping his hands before his body in a desperate gesture. His face was red and swollen, looking so radically different from the sharply outlined, tan muscles of his bare torso. "I don't want to lose you, Squall... I know I fucked up, and I'll do whatever you want, I... please don't go... I can't... I... I can't take it, I... Please don't go, please... Stay with me... please, I'm begging you... _please_... please stay..."

The handsome brunette teen continued to stare at his trembling opposite in silence, too scared to believe Seifer's words, half expecting to be betrayed once more. Yet, no matter with how much skepticism and disbelief he searched the blond's jade green eyes, he could find no lie there, only a long nurtured and unguarded kind of affection that nobody in the world could possibly have faked.

If he had ever believed anyone in his entire life, it was right that very moment, when Seifer laid his fragile heart out before his feet, freely exposing it to be subjected to the same kind of torture that Squall's heart had endured only minutes before and was still enduring now.

Squall could have hurt him then. It would have been almost too easy. He could've had his vengeance and broken Seifer perhaps for the rest of his life, just to allow him a taste of the agony that he had to experience _every single_ day... but the brunette had never been that kind of person, and therefore, he accepted Seifer's words for what they were and finally nodded his head very, very slowly.

Seifer saw that gesture, saw how Squall's rigid features gradually became softer, and he understood. Drawing a hitched breath, Seifer lunged towards the brunette and yanked him into his arms, crying and breathing and stuttering at the same time.

"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry... Squall... Please don't hate me, please... I'm sorry... please... I'm sorry for _everything_..."

Squall stood very still, allowing Seifer's emotions to rush over him like a tidal wave. The pain that had been inflicted on him by Seifer's actions was still there, somewhere beneath the rippling surface of emotions caused by the blond's confession that had completely overwhelmed him. He had known that Seifer was attracted to him, of course, yet his words had still caught Squall off his guard. He didn't know why he believed Seifer in the current, twisted situation, but he did, and he only hoped that his intuition would not fail him in the end.

He shivered slightly, feeling the blond's arms squeezing him tighter in return, as if the older boy was still afraid to lose him. Seifer continued to be a sobbing wreck, bearing down upon his smaller opposite in their fierce embrace, and his raw emotional distress finally caused Squall's compassion and protective instincts to kick in.

Sighing, Squall traced awkward, loose circles on the blond's broad, heavily muscled back, while allowing Seifer to press his face into his neck. He couldn't understand half of what the blond was muttering between his sniffling intakes of breath, but it made very little difference. There was no rational way to explain this abrupt turn in their relationship, which, quite truthfully, should have ended tonight, considering the circumstances. Squall had been hurt and let down in a way he had never been let down before, yet he trusted that Seifer was telling him the truth, not because his words were well-chosen or even made any sense, but because he knew in his heart that the blond's feelings for him had always been sincere.

'_In a way... this is probably all my fault...'_

Squall closed his eyes for a moment, admitting to himself how jaded and callous he had been towards Seifer ever since their very first meeting. He hadn't known any better then, and he probably didn't know any better now, but as long as Seifer could make peace with that fact, Squall was willing to give this a try.

'_Maybe we just... need to start over...'_

"... Hey," the brunette finally whispered gruffly, squeezing the blond's shoulder. "Stop crying already..."

Too afraid he was going to upset Squall even more than he already had, Seifer was quick to comply. With a gritty cough, he choked back his tears and loosened his hold on the smaller brunette. He wouldn't quite trust his voice to be steady enough to talk just yet, so he just inched away from Squall to stare down into his face, completely awed by the boy's beauty and the fact that he hadn't left him after everything he had done.

Squall returned his charring gaze with a gleam of insecurity in his dusk blue eyes. It was hard for him to be looked at like this. Clearing his throat, he finally grunted a gruff, "What?"

"Squall... Squall, I... I'm sorry for what I did... for what you had to see..." Seifer finally explained, his voice tight, the guilt evident in his inflection. "I... there is no way for me to explain this that would make it okay... Because it's _not_ okay. What I did was so fucked up... so completely fucked up. I... I have no right to ask this of you, but... can you try to forgive me? Please? At least... at least try to give me a chance to make it better."

Squall frowned, and Seifer saw darkness and hurt flickering across his face, but they dissipated almost immediately to be replaced by a calmer, lighter expression.

"I'm still here, aren't I?" the boy replied simply, holding Seifer's gaze.

"I know... and I don't know how I deserve it, but you have no idea how glad I am you're still with me," Seifer sighed, pressing his lips against Squall's forehead as he pulled him closer with one arm. "It will never happen again... I promise you. I didn't realize how much I love you... how much it hurts _me_ to see you suffer. Nothing in this world is worth hurting you. Nothing is worth seeing that look on your face... it fuckin' kills me, I can't take it. It makes me regret breaking my neighbor's Barbie doll when I was four, I swear it hurts that fuckin' much. I have never... ever felt like this before... about anyone. You... are more important to me than anything or anyone else has ever been."

Squall swallowed at those words, and he could feel Seifer's heart pounding against his chest, his breath hot against his throat. In an entirely innocent, almost naïve way, Squall was startled that he could evoke this kind of primal, physical response from someone.

He had no idea how much he still had to learn.

"Squall," Seifer suddenly muttered, easing them apart once more. "Please, stay with me tonight. I want to talk to you... about everything."

Squall nodded semi-consciously, remembering the original motivation for his late night visit to Seifer's apartment, but then he stopped, and Seifer noticed him scowling.

"What about—" the brunette started, but he was interrupted promptly, as if Seifer had read his mind.

"It's okay. It'll take me less than a minute to kick her out."

The brunette seemed to hesitate, and Seifer could tell how uneasy he was by the way his facial muscles twitched. To his surprise, however, Squall suddenly performed a vague nod.

"... Alright."

Relieved, Seifer pulled him into a quick hug once more, before letting him go and walking him barefoot towards the building at a languid, even pace. Truthfully, he would have rather carried Squall, or at least led him by the hand, if only to make sure that he wouldn't suddenly change his mind and run off, but he had learned tonight that physically smothering the brunette would get him nowhere.

Squall was a complicated guy, and yet, in the end, his mindset was probably a whole lot simpler than Seifer would've ever expected.

'_I don't think he ever meant any harm by what he said. When he gets scared, he lashes out. He's probably just as confused as I was when I hooked up with a guy for the first time. I wish I would have thought about this earlier tonight, before I took that bimbo home with me. Ugh... what was I thinking? I'm such an asshole. What's wrong with me? All I really wanted was for him to understand how much he fuckin' means to me. I'd do anything to make him happy. I wonder if he's ever going to believe me now.'_

When they had finally reached the top of the stairs, Seifer awkwardly turned towards Squall, whose expression was closed.

"Listen... I'll take care of this," Seifer breathed, sounding more confident than he felt as he rubbed the back of his head. He hated that he had dragged Squall into this mess. "Just wait outside, if you want. I don't think it'll be too pretty, I'm afraid. She's gonna cause a scene."

He hadn't quite expected Squall to shrug and say, in a very cool, demure tone of voice, "I don't really care. She couldn't say anything she's never said before."

The blond gave him a puzzled look. Obviously, this wasn't the kind of response he had expected. Squall, however, simply turned his face towards the open door to Seifer's apartment, saying nothing further as his eyes went hard with determination.

"Well... okay," Seifer responded slowly. "If you're sure that's what you want."

Still a bit taken aback by the brunette's boldness, Seifer stepped through to the door, and Squall followed him inside. It was still dark in the blond's apartment, but Squall could make out Shiva, who was perched patiently next to one of the kitchen windows. With a small smile, the brunette walked over to the beautiful Alaskan Malamute, who greeted him with a wagging tail.

Seifer watched them both, standing by the window, drenched in the cold, white moonlight. Squall was so hauntingly beautiful, it was too easy to forget the task at hand.

Shaking his head, the blond forced himself to focus.

'_Shit... where is she, anyway? Still in the bedroom?'_

Sighing, Seifer grabbed his phone off the kitchen counter, dialed the number to a local taxi service, and walked towards the half-closed bedroom door, his steps sluggish on the carpet.

God, how he hated drama.

'_... I guess tonight, I deserve it. This is all my fault. I acted like a total dirt bag. Shit. What a fuckin' mess.'_

Grunting, he pushed the door open and walked inside, his phone tilted to his ear as his green eyes searched the room. He found Rinoa laid out on the bed, covered only haphazardly with one of his sheets. Seifer frowned when she sat up to look at him, purposely leaving her chest exposed.

"Seifer," she started, reprimand to her thin voice. "Where the hell did you go? I've been waiting, you know."

Seifer stared at her as he listened to the dial tone of his phone, realizing that the dark haired girl meant absolutely nothing to him. In all truth, he no longer even found her attractive. He was disgusted with himself for even bringing her over – for using her body as a cheap means of forgetting Squall's hurtful words at the dance, and maybe even trying to get under the brunette boy's skin in some stupid fit of jealousy.

"You have to go," Seifer stated plainly, looking her dead in the eye, watching how the sensual façade of her features was crumbling.

"_What_?" she asked sharply, looking at him completely thunderstruck. Out of instinct, she yanked the sheet she had been holding in her lap towards her chest, covering herself up.

"I'm calling you a cab right now," the blond explained matter-of-factly. "Put your clothes on."

"What are you talking about?" she asked shrilly. "What's going on here?"

"I made a mistake by bringing you here. I want you to leave. It's a simple as that. So please, do me a favor, put on your clothes and get the fuck out."

"W-what? You can't do that!" the girl protested.

"This is my apartment. I can do whatever the hell I want," he replied coldly.

"What is your problem, asshole?" she spat, her jaw now trembling with anger. He noticed how her cheeks had become flushed. "Why do you always do this? What's the matter with you? Are you fucking impotent?"

"No," he snarled, "But I realized that fucking you isn't worth losing what's important to me. Fucking you isn't worth _anything_."

"You... what are you—"

"Get the fuck dressed. Now. Don't make me throw you out there without your clothes on. Because I will."

With that, he stepped out of the room, barely dodging a pillow that she had thrown at him in blind anger. As he paced around the living room, ordering a cab to pick up his unwanted guest, he watched Squall out of the corner of his eyes. The brunette was still standing by the window, leaning with his back against the wall, his right hand resting on top of Shiva's head. His expression was completely unreadable.

'_... I can't believe he's still here. After everything I've already put him through tonight. He must care more than he's ever let on this entire time.'_

Finally, after a minute or so had passed, Rinoa came stomping out of the bedroom, looking irate as she was trying to fix her dress, with her shoes dangling in one hand. Apparently, she was considering to chuck them at Seifer's face, until her gaze drifted past the blond and came to a sudden rest on his brunette companion instead.

As her dark brown eyes widened, Rinoa gasped, "You? What are _you _doing here?"

Squall, however, said nothing and returned her confused gaze with great calm. There was no emotion on the beautiful surface of his face at all, only perfect tranquility.

Rinoa, however, was on the verge of an emotional volcanic eruption.

"I knew it!" she suddenly screamed as her initial shock had passed, and her eyes were cutting madly back and forth between Squall to Seifer. "I knew it! You're fucking him, Seifer, aren't you? _Aren't_ you? You're disgusting! You're both faggots!"

At that moment, Seifer threw his phone in her direction, and it flew by her face to shatter against the wall behind her with an earsplitting noise.

"Get out!" Seifer yelled angrily at the girl, who held her hands clutched to her mouth. Her body was trembling. "Get the _fuck_ out of my house!"

"You... you..." Rinoa started, her brown eyes dancing with stubborn, proud tears. "You're crazy, you... You don't even know what you're doing... You kick me out for _him_? You're not the only one who's fucking him, you—"

By that point, Seifer had heard enough. Without further discussion, the red-faced blond had walked up to Rinoa and grabbed her by the arm, dragging her towards the door as she was yelping "Stop! Don't touch me, what are you doing, you—"

With raised eyebrows, Squall watched as the blond thrust her outside and slammed the door shut in her face. They could still hear her screaming outside, hurling nasty insults at Seifer that ranged from "faggot" to "gay fucker" to "asshole", but after a few moments of blind rage, her voice finally seemed to subside. Seifer still stood beside the door, his back turned towards his brunette guest. Squall saw him cracking the knuckles of his right hand several times, and he worried for a moment that the blond might do something stupid, but before he would've seen a need to intervene, Seifer suddenly turned around and immediately shifted his gaze towards Squall.

They stood quietly, staring at each other from across the room. Squall's eyes were slightly narrowed and his posture had stiffened, but he hadn't moved an inch from his position by the window. Shiva had left his side to circle Seifer several times, sniffing him thoroughly, as if to ensure that her master was okay. Finally, she seemed satisfied and simply disappeared into the kitchen, out of their sight.

After several more minutes spent in unsure silence, Seifer finally heaved a deep groan and started to scratch the side of his neck with his middle finger in a gesture of insecurity.

"I'm sorry you had to listen to that," he apologized flatly. "I really—"

But Squall cut him off with a quick, impatient wave of his hand. Looking stone-faced, he paced over to Seifer's large couch, where he dropped into the seat cushions and placed his elbows on his knees with a long sigh. He was holding his head low, but from what little he could see of Squall's expression, Seifer could tell that the brunette wanted to talk.

Feeling slightly nervous, Seifer slowly walked across the room and sat down by Squall's side. The brunette looked too handsome in his tight fitting black shirt and well-tailored slacks, but Seifer was trying not to get distracted. Anything Squall could possibly have to say was a thousand times more important to him than trying to get into anyone's pants – the dark haired boy's included.

"Aren..." the brunette finally started in a rusty voice, clearing his throat, "... Doesn't exist."

Seifer chose not to say anything; he also didn't mention the fact that he had been snooping through the younger male's yearbook. Instead, he decided to watch in expectant silence and listen as Squall performed a few vague, aimless gestures with his hands and let out an uncomfortable groan.

"I've never dated anybody," Squall continued, looking almost ridiculously innocent. "Neither a guy nor a girl."

"Then why did you make up this fake ex-boyfriend?" Seifer asked, watching the brunette carefully from the side. "I admit... you actually had me a little bit jealous there for a while."

Squall grimaced wryly, and he quietly said, "I didn't mean to lie. It just... seemed like the easiest explanation at the time."

"I guess I see your point, but... can you tell me what's really bothering you then, if not some old relationship?" Seifer asked after a moment of hesitation. "Please. I want to understand."

Sighing, Squall leaned back, rubbing his hand across his eyes. He suddenly looked tired.

"It's complicated, and I can't really explain it to you," Squall admitted honestly as he stared at the ceiling, "But... I do like you. It just... it's not easy for me. You're a lot more experienced than I am. I've never done any of this before. It's all new to me, and... it... kinda scares me."

The brunette's genuine words and hesitant vulnerability caused a smile to spread across Seifer's handsome face. Gently, he reached out and touched Squall's shoulder, who accredited the gesture with a look of uncertainty. "I understand how you feel," Seifer murmured, as patiently as he could, not knowing that he had no true concept of what Squall was _really_ going through, "Really, I do. I was there once, too, you know. I know it's tough. I shouldn't have pushed you to do things you weren't ready to do. Your family is your business. If you don't want to tell your mother about us, it's not my place to force you. I'm sorry."

"I... already told her. I told her that... we were, uh... dating."

Seifer arched a brow in surprise. He didn't know what surprised him more – the fact that Squall had just declared that he basically considered them a couple, or that he had willingly informed his mother about it.

"Are you _serious_?" the blond asked. "For real?"

"Yeah," Squall nodded. "I told her earlier, in the car. Well, actually it was more like... she was the one who brought it up. She said she already knew. And... she was completely fine with it. I should've known and just told her, instead of being such a dick to you about it for no real reason. So... I'm sorry."

"Wow," Seifer whistled. "I wish my mom was cool like that. She about blew a fuckin' vessel when I told her I was gay. Man... I'm really impressed. What about your stepfather? Does he know?"

"No," Squall shot back, too quickly to not sound suspicious. "And I wanna keep it that way."

Seifer's sharp green eyes traced Squall's profile, noting that there was a change to the set of his features, however subtle. He could tell that Squall didn't trust his stepfather, and that there were probably far more issues between the two than the brunette would ever willingly divulge.

Just what role did Kato Kearan play in his stepson's life?

"Squall," Seifer started, knowing that he'd have to tread very carefully on this particular subject if he didn't immediately want to set the brunette off, "Why is it you don't get along with your stepdad?"

"You mean aside from the fact that he's a fucking jerk off?" Squall quipped sarcastically, producing a weak half-smirk, before he finally shrugged evasively. "I don't know. We just don't get along. It's always been that way, I guess. I can't stand him. And I'd rather not talk about him."

Seifer nodded slowly. "... Okay."

The blond knew, if only out of instinct, that there was more to Squall's relationship with his stepparent than just an obvious dislike, but he could also tell that the hardheaded brunette was in no mood to discuss the matter any further. Part of him wanted to press the issue, because he figured that it was important, but Squall Leonhart wasn't the type to be coerced into spilling his secrets, and Seifer figured that he had caused enough damage for one night. Thus, he decided to let the topic go, at least for the time being, and he suddenly wrapped one arm around Squall's neck and slowly pulled him closer, wanting to replace inquisition with intimacy.

"Come here," he muttered as he reclined into a more comfortable position on the couch, coaxing Squall against his bare chest. The brunette seemed confused, but he didn't struggle when Seifer pulled him into a close, comforting embrace, placed his hand against his head and gingerly started to stroke his hair. With his cheek resting against Seifer's broad chest, Squall could feel his skin going warm, but the sensation itself wasn't necessarily uncomfortable.

"Relax," Seifer whispered, and Squall could feel the blond's breath reverberating in his lungs. "I know I hurt you... but I promise I won't do it again. I don't ever want to hurt you. I'm so sorry."

Squall could still feel that sharp stinging sensation in his chest, right across his heart, but the pain over Seifer's betrayal had dulled, and he ultimately allowed himself to ease into the brawny blond's soothing touch. As much as he hated to admit it, he understood Seifer's motives – why the blond had taken Rinoa home with him – and although it didn't make tonight's events hurt any less, it also didn't change the fact that Seifer was _still_ the only person that Squall felt remotely safe with.

'_Maybe I should know better... Maybe I should just walk away now, while I still can, before he fucks up again. But... I just don't want to run away anymore. I'm so tired of it.'_

As Squall admitted defeat to his own emotions, he could feel a warm drowsiness come over him, and his muscles, which were always tensed for a fight or a quick escape, relaxed as his breathing slowed and he nestled in the crook of Seifer's arm on the couch. The blond's fingers were stroking the skin at his temple very lightly, caressing without urgency or demand. As Shiva came and settled on the floor by Seifer's legs, Squall was drifting into a peaceful state of near-slumber, constantly listening to the sound of the blond's heartbeat. Seifer could feel him twitching occasionally, and he smiled, enjoying Squall's body against him much more than he could've ever enjoyed Rinoa's, or anyone else's.

As he whispered a quiet, hoarse "I love you," into the dark haired boy's ear, the night fell silent all around them, and for the first time in three long years, Squall didn't feel afraid of the dark.

-:-

There's a new day at dawn and I've finally arrived.  
If I'm there in the morning, baby, you'll know I've survived.  
I can't believe it, I can't believe I'm alive,  
But without you it just doesn't seem right.  
Oh, where are you tonight?

"_Where Are You Tonight" – Bob Dylan_

-:-

* * *

Love that Bob Dylan song :) And hope you enjoyed this chapter... because it sure was a pain to write, lol!


	29. Heart of a Lion

-:-  
**Chapter 29  
****Heart of a Lion**

"_My life was changed that night... in more ways than you will ever know."_

-:-

"Say, cupcake... have you ever considered modeling?"

Looking up from the small stash of photographs in his hand, Seifer threw a teasing gaze at the brunette driver sitting to his left, who was navigating his huge pick-up truck across the rocky slopes of the Alclad mountain range at a dangerous speed. His chauffeur for the day, Squall Leonhart, only twisted his head to the side in a brief, nonchalant manner, with his middle finger so high in the air that Seifer could have seen it from a mile afar.

"Have you ever considered _fucking yourself_?" Squall deadpanned, before returning his attention to the road.

"Why yes, as a matter of fact, I _have_, but that's beside the point right now," Seifer responded lightly, and he snickered when he saw his companion rolling his eyes. "Be honest, if you could get it on with yourself, _you'd_ never leave the house either, sweetheart."

"... You're a retard. Completely mental, I swear."

"Come on, seriously though, did you look at these pictures?" the blond asked, waving one of the photographs, which had been taken before their Homecoming date, in Squall's direction. The younger teen flicked him an annoyed glance, before shrugging one shoulder to show his indifference.

"Yeah. Your point?"

"My point is that you could totally make _bank_ with this!" Seifer exclaimed theatrically. "You're a sexy motherfucker, and despite your grumpy face you take some amazing fuckin' pictures. Scouting agents would gobble this shit up. Hell, I wanna have _sex_ with your picture _right now_!"

Out of narrowed eyes, Squall watched how his classmate leered at the glossy image, before happily rubbing it against his khaki short covered crotch. With a snort of disgust, the brunette abruptly cut the steering wheel to the right, causing them to swerve and Seifer to bite off a small, squeaky cry of surprise.

"_Whoa_!" the blond yelped, looking over at Squall with a slightly panicked look. "What the hell, are you tryin' to _kill_ us?"

Squall regarded him with a wry, deliberately psychopathic grin that, on anyone else, would have looked nothing like a smile. Shuddering, Seifer shook his head.

"... Remind me to never trust you with this 400 horsepower rig ever again."

Seifer had never been one to willingly let other people drive his truck, because he had always been quite possessive when it came to his belongings, but this had been the only way he had been able to convince Squall to take a trip to the Alclad with him on this beautifully warm Saturday afternoon. Fall was slowly fading all around them in fascinating hues of yellow, orange and red, and the blond had wanted nothing more than to spend their day away from school and work up in the mountains, at Cosmo Canyon, with Squall by his side. Initially, the brunette had been worried that Seifer's mountain sickness would strike again, but eventually (after a lot of coaxing and pleading from the blond's end) Squall had agreed to the excursion under the sole condition that he'd be the one driving.

As the blond absentmindedly played with the stash of pictures in his hand, his gaze drifted outside the window, to the impressive landscape flying by. His thoughts, however, were elsewhere. His memories of the previous night, when he had almost driven Squall out of his life forever, were still too new and painful to be so easily forgotten. They had passed out on the couch together that evening, spending a few, peaceful hours of sleep in each other's arms.

Seifer still didn't understand how he had gotten so incredibly lucky.

'_He stayed with me all night, and he didn't even seem grumpy in the morning, when I took him home. I really figured he'd never talk to me again after what I did. Yet here he is, going to the mountains with me, just because I asked him to. I can't really believe it.'_

When he had picked Squall up earlier that afternoon, only Ellone, Raine, and her son had been home. Much to the blond's excitement, Raine had handed him copies of the pictures that they had taken together before the Homecoming dance. She had treated him with great kindness, and although he hadn't expected much else, part of him had still been worried that she wouldn't approve of him being Squall's boyfriend. Granted, him and Squall hadn't had an official 'relationship talk', but for all he was concerned, the two of them were an item.

That boy was _his_ territory, and Seifer had all intentions of claiming it left, right and center.

"Oh yeah, by the way," Seifer suddenly raised his voice, turning around towards Squall as something in his face lit up, "Selphie called my cell earlier."

He noticed a crease between the brunette's eyebrows, but Squall's inflection was neutral when he asked, "Selphie? Why?"

"She was trying to figure out what happened to us last night, and where we disappeared to," he explained willingly, scratching his head. "I told her, and she pretty much let me have it. Man, I haven't been cussed out like that in a long time. Don't get me wrong, I know I deserved it... I just figured you should know that she really cares about you. She was seriously worried. Eh, that reminds me, I need to buy a new home phone."

Squall nodded thoughtfully, but kept his eyes on the road. He had never given Selphie his cell phone number, not because he disliked her, but because he preferred to keep everything related to his private life just that – _private_. They had never spent time together outside of work, at least not until Seifer had come along and turned his whole life upside down.

'_If someone had told me last year that I was going to go to a school dance, with a guy no less, I would've thought they were out of their goddamn fucking mind. Granted, when it comes down to it, I didn't stay very long at the stupid dance, but I did go. And the only reason I went in the first place is...'_

The brunette turned his head to stare at Seifer's handsome face, and his mind simply went blank. It still amazed him how close Seifer was to him, not just physically but emotionally, too. The blond had walked into his life and torn down walls that Squall had erected throughout years of hurt, insecurity and betrayal. Squall trusted Seifer, as much as he was probably capable of trusting another human being, considering his twisted family situation and his past. Of course, there were some things Squall would never tell Seifer, no matter how persistently the obstinate blond would pry.

'_If he found out about Kato... I don't know what he'd do. Probably something stupid. He'd probably be angry with me for never saying anything, and I'm sure he'd be disgusted with the way my body is now, after everything that Kato has done. I just feel like... no matter how many showers I take or how many years go by, I'll never get clean again...'_

Squall rubbed the back of his hand across his mouth, feeling nauseated. It made him angry that Kato had this much control over him and his emotions even when he wasn't around. Just the mere thought of the man made Squall feel hurt, powerless and insignificant. There was so much hatred and pain bottled up inside of him, and for the white hot flash of an instant, Squall wanted to grab the next best sharp object he could find and cut himself to the bone, just so he could stop seeing Kato's face inside his head.

'_Stop... Just stop...'_

He shook his head and adjusted his focus back to the road. The sickness in his stomach subsided as he concentrated on the deep blue skies and pale grey mountains outside, which were seamed by endless waves of green grass.

'_There is nothing he can do to me up here. Nothing at all.'_

Squall let out the breath he had unconsciously been holding in, and it was then that he realized that Seifer was staring at him from the side. Puzzled, the brunette reciprocated the blond's gaze, finding Seifer's eyes narrowed in suspicion and his head slanted, almost as if he was waiting on something.

"What?" Squall asked flatly.

"What in the world were you just thinking about?" Seifer asked, frowning. "You looked like you were about to throw up. You alright?"

"Yeah, of course," the brunette responded promptly, but looked away. "I just felt sick for a second, that's all."

"Why?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Squall growled, his tone exasperate.

"Have you eaten today?"

"Not really."

"What?" Seifer asked. "Why not?"

Squall shrugged in response. "I don't know. I just didn't think about it."

"How can you _not_ think about food all day? Do you not get hungry?"

"No," Squall answered honestly, and Seifer was amazed by how unperturbed he looked. "I don't really get hungry, I just kinda eat when I think about it."

Seifer raised his eyebrows at him and concluded, "That's really weird."

Squall shot him a pissed off look and hissed, "Shut up. I don't need your editorials, okay?"

"No, you're right, what you need is a _sandwich_," Seifer declared with a disarming smile, unimpressed by Squall's temper. "Good thing I thought about bringing us some dinner."

"... What did you bring, anyway?" Squall asked, subtly trying to move the focus of their conversation away from himself and his abnormal eating habits.

"A bunch of stuff, it's back there in the cooler," Seifer said, jabbing his thumb over his shoulder towards the back seat. Squall glanced back briefly, noticing a large red cooler, a plaid blanket, and a closed, square wicker basket.

"What is all of that?" the brunette inquired curiously.

"Stuff for our picnic."

Squall arched an eyebrow.

"We're having a _picnic_?"

"Yeah, I went to the store and bought sandwiches, different kinds of salad, fruit, candy, and of course... beer!"

"Beer? You brought _beer_?" the dark haired teenager quipped, a shade of reprimand to his tone.

"Yeah, but don't worry, I brought some water and soda too. You don't drink alcohol, do you?"

"No, I don't," Squall shook his head, looking slightly taken aback. "How'd you know that?"

Seifer shrugged coolly. "Intuition."

The brunette let out a snort of indignation, but deep down he had to admit that he was touched by Seifer's thoughtfulness.

Perhaps he wasn't such an inconsiderate bastard after all.

"Besides," the blond suddenly snickered, looking mischievous, "You, sweetpea, are underage."

"And why in all _hell_ do you look so excited about that?" Squall asked with a mistrusting frown.

"Well, I've always wanted to get it on with a piece of jail bait, and what do ya know, here's my chance!" Seifer exclaimed, rubbing his palms together and cackling gleefully until Squall reached out with his right hand and smacked him hard upside the head.

"Dumbass," the brunette growled.

"Man, you're so _violent_," Seifer observed, rubbing the side of his jaw. "I mean, I like to be disciplined and all, but this is getting a bit out of hand, ya know. Although, I admit, it kinda gives me a hard-on when you're being all dominant like that!"

Instead of supplying the blond with yet more reasons to pick on him, Squall chose to make an indistinct noise of repulsion and shook his head in defeat.

'_Hopeless. He's completely fucking hopeless. Why do I even bother?'_

In an effort to distract Seifer and diffuse his perverted mood, Squall turned on the radio and cranked up the volume. It was Seifer's favorite rock station, of course, blaring one of the more popular tunes of the season, and the pleasant interruption caused the blond to give his companion an appreciative once-over from the side. Squall looked as hot in a pair of slacks and a dress shirt as he did in faded, torn blue jeans, biker boots, and a fitted, punk rock inspired dark blue t-shirt. Seifer also noticed the heavy, silver chain of a necklace that Squall had never worn before, with an interesting looking pendant resting on the brunette's chest, as well as his typical set of leather and stainless steel adorned wrist bands.

"What's this?"

Leaning across the seat console between them and reaching out, Seifer took the pendant laced around Squall's neck into his right hand and examined it with interest. It was a fascinating piece of jewelry; an odd creation that was a combination of a lion's roaring head and a cross. It was made of heavy, brushed silver that didn't at all look delicate to him, and on the back he noticed an imprint that read '_Sleeping Lion Heart_.'

Squall, meanwhile, swiped an almost hasty sideway glance at the other boy, noting the sudden intrusion of his personal space with a reflexive kind of suspicion. He did, however, resist his initial urge to slap Seifer's hand away. He knew that the blond's curiosity was mostly harmless, and he forced himself to endure Seifer's examination of his treasured necklace as if it didn't bother him one bit.

After all, the only reason he had worn it openly today, instead of concealed under his shirt as usual, was because he had seen no harm in Seifer discovering it.

He glanced at the blond past tousled, dark brown fringes of freshly washed hair, his eyes a brighter shade of blue than usual as the mountain sky seemed to reflect in their depths. Seifer looked up at him from the necklace with a disarming smile, his expression curious.

"My mother and my sister gave it to me," Squall finally explained in a demure tone, but Seifer could tell that the pendant was more meaningful than his emotionless inflection was letting on.

"Is it new? I've never seen you wear it before," Seifer noted.

"No, I've had it for a while," the brunette said, shaking his head. "It was a birthday present. I wear it most of the time."

"How come I've never noticed it before?"

"I guess 'cause I usually put it underneath my shirt."

Seifer cocked an eyebrow skeptically. "Why would you do that? It looks cool as hell."

He noticed that the brunette suddenly looked uncomfortable, and his eyes searched Squall's face more closely. It was the little, seemingly unimportant habits and quirks of Squall's that seemed to define him the most and gave away his secrets in very unexpected ways.

Squall, of course, seemed to realize this too, because his expression quickly became closed and his eyes seemed distant.

"I just don't want everyone to see it," he murmured in a low, evasive voice. "Anyway, it's not a big deal."

Seifer considered disagreeing with him, but he could tell that Squall was finished with the topic for the time being. He was impressed and oddly moved by the fact that Squall would let him see and touch a piece of jewelry that he usually kept covered up, and he didn't wanna ruin the brunette's frail trust in him by prying too much. Thus, he released the pendant from his hand and retreated to his side of the bench without putting up any further arguments.

"So," he said, looking Squall up and down once more, licking his lips suggestively. "I was wondering about something."

Squall regarded him with a hard, guarded glare in his eyes as his hands turned the steering wheel and he maneuvered them down the rocky stretch of road that led to the Cosmo Canyon reservoir, which he could see glimmering in a soft blue in the distance.

"About what?" the dark haired biker asked warily.

"Have you ever had outdoors sex before?" Seifer grinned, winking seductively.

Squall's face twitched in response, and he threw his head to the side in frustration.

Honestly, why hadn't he seen this coming?

"Will you quit talking about sex already?" the brunette snarled gruffly. "Fuck. Tell your hormones to take a fucking breather!"

"Aw, c'mon, sour puss, I was just kidding," Seifer snickered, although the humor didn't reach his eyes.

Quite truthfully, ever since Squall had confided in him that Aren Collins was nothing but a figment of his imagination and that he had never dated anyone in his life, Seifer had been wondering whether that meant that the brunette was still a virgin, after all. Of course, it was possible that Squall had fooled around with other people he had been wise enough not to mention to him, but Seifer considered that option doubtful. Squall had lied to him to justify his fear of sex and other intimate physical contact, and back then, it had all made sense. Now, after Squall's confession, Seifer knew better, but consequently he was once again left with no viable explanation for the brunette's skittishness.

If a fucked up ex-boyfriend wasn't the reason for Squall's intimacy issues, what _was_?

'_He's gotten a lot better than he was when I first met him. He doesn't freak out every time I touch him. He doesn't really seem to mind when we hug or kiss, although I'm always the one that initiates it. Still... something's not right. Even if he's just insecure because he's never dated a guy before, he's more scared of me than he should be. There's more going on than just him not knowing what he's doing. He's afraid, and I wanna know why.'_

"... We're here."

Seifer turned his focus outward once more, finding them pulled into a parking spot right by Cosmo Canyon reservoir. Apparently, he had spaced out for much longer than he had realized. Squall was looking at him from the other end of the bench seat, his posture relaxed and his face so mind-bendingly beautiful that it caused Seifer's chest to ache with affection for the brunette teen. Squall's eyes were a light, vivid shade of blue, glittering at him past fringes of coffee brown hair.

The brunette chuckled softly.

"What's the matter with you?" Squall asked quietly, tilting his head.

Suddenly, Seifer leaned over and reached out towards Squall's face, gently brushing aside the long, chunky bangs carelessly falling into his eyes. It was an odd, unexpectedly sentimental gesture, and he noticed the surprise in the dark haired boy's expression. Seifer responded to Squall's insecurity with a warm, genuine smile that was radiating tenderness.

"... I love you."

The brunette boy's eyes widened, and by the abrupt, jerky movement of his jugular, Seifer could tell that he was swallowing. Before Squall could have given a response of any kind, Seifer had quickly retreated once more, and he was nonchalantly unbuckling his seatbelt, acting as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened.

"Alright, let's get out!" he exclaimed happily, already throwing his door open.

Squall, who was still slightly taken aback by the sudden, unforeseen emotional tension between them, watched him hopping out of the truck with an estranged look on his face. He had to take a moment to rearrange his thoughts and compose himself, not understanding why the blond always managed to catch him off guard.

'_... Weirdo. Sometimes I wonder if he says these things just to see if he can confuse the shit out of me. I mean... Where the hell did that just come from?'_

Sighing in frustration, Squall turned off the engine of the truck and finally climbed out of the vehicle as well. With carefully masked curiosity, he watched Seifer, who was stretching like a feline in the sunlight, extending his muscular arms far towards the sky while letting out a low, guttural groan of content.

"This is great!" the tall eighteen year old declared blissfully, before grinning over at his younger companion. "Come on, let's go for a hike around the lake!"

Squall placed his weight on one foot and crossed his arms before his body, looking stern and defensive for no particular reason.

"What about the food?" he asked skeptically.

"It'll be alright in the cooler. There's plenty of ice in there. Unless you're trying to tell me that you're hungry?"

The dark haired boy immediately shook his head in response. "No. I'm fine."

"Alright, let's go then! Come on!"

As Seifer took off through the high grass towards the water, bursting with energy, Squall couldn't help but chuckle just a little bit, before he stuffed the truck keys into his pocket and willingly followed in the blond's steps.

"Hey, wait up!"

And so they spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the lake, exploring every rock and tree stump, basking in the sunlight, running barefoot through the water and toying around like two children who didn't have a care in the world. There were several other families up near the lake with them, some with small toddlers that were playing on the beach or attempting to fish, but Seifer and Squall mostly paid them little mind, too occupied with each other and the beauty of the nature all around them. Time passed almost too quickly, and before they knew it, the sun was fading on the horizon.

A quiet, inky darkness now enveloped that small piece of idyllic wilderness, but Seifer had not come unprepared. He had brought a few Hawaiian torches, which he lit carefully and staked around a clearing between his truck and the lake, conveniently hidden amongst tall bushes and thick blades of grass. They spread a blanket on the ground and laid on their stomachs, eating sandwiches, salad, candy, and drinking cold beer and water. Even Squall, who seemed to able to sustain his energy without much noteworthy nutrition, was hungrily scarfing down his food and sipping on some Sprite as he watched the flickering flames of the torches that surrounded them.

"This is awesome," Seifer muttered between mouthfuls of roast beef sandwich, then taking a swig of beer. "Man, I was starving."

Squall nodded as he rolled onto his side, wiping his hands with a napkin. "Yeah. It was a long day."

"I had a great time," Seifer said with a grin, and he was close enough to Squall to touch him. Chuckling, he poked the brunette into the side, teasing, "But you know, I don't appreciate you tripping me out there on the beach in front of all those kids."

Squall, who had a mischievous side on him that many wouldn't have expected, merely pulled his face into a grimace and joked, "I have no clue what you're talking about. It's not my fault you don't watch where you're going."

"Yeah right," the blond laughed, roughing up Squall's hair, which the brunette accredited with a muffled grunt. "I should kick your butt for being such a smartass."

"Whatever," Squall snorted, grinning and baring his teeth. "Good luck with that. I'd hate for you to hurt yourself, I mean, clumsy as you are and all."

"You little bastard," Seifer snickered, but as he pushed Squall over playfully, he realized that the brunette, who was much smaller in his build than Seifer, was shivering ever so softly.

"Hey, are you cold?" the blond asked, concern immediately tinting his inflection.

Squall, who had lowered himself onto his stomach once more and was supporting himself with his elbows, nodded hesitantly, but tried to play it off.

"It's no big deal, I'm fine," the dark haired teen murmured, playing with the wrapper of a rice krispie bar he had devoured a few minutes ago.

"Aww... I'll keep you warm, I promise," Seifer offered suggestively, causing the brunette to roll his eyes.

"Shut up."

"What, you don't want me to?" the blond said, faking disappointment, before his viridian green eyes suddenly lit up with excitement. "Hey, I have another idea! Follow me!"

"Huh?"

Squall watched him jumping to his feet and motioning him to get up.

"Come on," Seifer urged, extending his hand towards Squall to offer him help up. "Let's go!"

"But—"

"Come on!" the blond repeated eagerly.

Confused, Squall finally took the blond's hand and allowed the taller male to pull him upwards. He was surprised when Seifer didn't let go of his hand, and instead dragged him away from the blanket, towards his truck.

"Where are we going, what—"

"We're going to keep you warm, cupcake."

Squall continued to stumble after the blond, looking around nervously to make sure that nobody was paying attention to them as they were walking hand in hand. Fortunately, the other visitors seemed to be closer to the lake and mostly out of sight. He didn't understand what Seifer was up to, and the fact that the brawny teen led him back to their vehicle bewildered him even more.

"Are we leaving?" Squall asked as they finally stopped next to Seifer's truck and the blond let go of his hand.

"No."

Squall scrunched his eyebrows together impatiently and demanded, "Then what are we doing?"

"Just wait," Seifer answered secretively. "Hey, lemme see the keys to the truck. Don't worry, I'm not going to drive."

"Uhm, okay..."

Still looking puzzled, Squall retrieved the keys from his jeans pocket and surrendered them to Seifer. He watched as the blond unlocked the vehicle, opened the driver's door and started the engine. Then, Seifer rolled down all of the windows, and Squall could hear music playing on the radio station as the soft chords swayed in the cool night air. Crossing his arms before his chest, he studied the bronze skinned male in khaki shorts, a light grey colored t-shirt and brown hiking boots as he circled the truck and walked up to him once more. There was suspicion and a certain stiffness to Squall's posture, but Seifer completely disregarded the wariness in the brunette's eyes and smiled at him affectionately.

"Climb on the hood of the truck with me," Seifer ordered, motioning towards the vehicle.

"What?" Squall asked, looking confused. "Why?"

"Just do it."

After an initial moment of hesitation, Squall skeptically followed Seifer's invitation, and they both climbed onto the hood of the blond's vehicle. It had been sitting in the sunlight all day, and now that the engine was running, too, Squall noticed the sudden, welcome warmth beneath him, and he finally understood.

'_So this is why...'_

He looked over at Seifer with a pleasantly surprised expression and a quiet thankfulness, and the blond smiled knowingly.

"Lay back."

Seifer reclined against the warm metal beneath them, and Squall quickly followed his example. They laid side by side, their arms folded behind their heads and their boot heels resting on the bumper, listening to some classic soft rock ballad playing on the radio as they stared up into the dark evening sky, finding a million stars seemingly sprinkled into that vast indigo canvas of the universe. They felt at peace with themselves, and at peace with the world. It was a feeling that Squall hadn't experienced in many, many years.

'_If there is such a thing as Heaven... I guess this must be as close as it's gonna get.'_

Seifer, whose elbow was touching Squall's, noticed with satisfaction that the brunette had stopped trembling. As he veered his head around slightly to gaze at the dark haired youth's perfectly cut profile, he felt a brief flash of love in his heart that was so incredibly bright that he feared it would burn out within seconds.

'_This is crazy... __Nothing's ever felt like this before. Nothing at all. He is so unbelievable, he's completely out of my league. I'll never do anything to hurt him ever again. I'd rather kill myself first.'_

"... Thank you."

He blinked, noting that Squall had turned to reciprocate his gaze, and his lips had parted to mutter quiet words of gratitude. Seifer reached out and gently caressed Squall's pale temple with the crooked knuckles of his index and middle finger. Squall acknowledged the sweet gesture with just the hint of a smile, before facing the sky once more.

"Cosmo Canyon," he said with a coarse whisper. "I guess... I kind of get it now."

Seifer was so touched by the near-childish purity of his expression that he finally sat up and leaned over Squall's reclined figure, looking down at him with fiercest, deepest longing smoldering in his dark green orbs. Squall's porcelain features were still, but he didn't avoid Seifer's gaze, and he didn't close his eyes until the blond lowered his upper body just enough to kiss him.

'_I love you... so much.'_

Seifer had placed his right hand on the side of Squall's taut, narrow waist, and his left hand somewhere near the brunette's head. The dark haired boy wasn't willfully touching him, but he was returning his kiss with the greatest, most carnal intensity. If Squall had never kissed before meeting the blond, by all means, he was certainly a natural. For a moment, Seifer's thoughts were swimming in his head, losing all sense of direction as white hot heat traveled to all areas of his body, and it took a long time for him to finally perceive the loud, abrupt noise coming from somewhere ahead of them.

'_What the...'_

He felt the brunette jerking beneath him, and he could tell that Squall had heard it, too. Quickly, he severed their physical contact, and both of them sat up apprehensively. There were shadows of persons running around up ahead in the distance, near the lake, incessantly moving beams of flashlights cutting through the darkness, and they could hear people shouting.

"What's going on?" Squall asked, narrowing his eyes. Seifer immediately noted the hunted edge to his voice.

"I don't know," he answered, sounding uneasy. "... Something's not right."

As they carefully continued to listen, they could finally make out some of the distant voices, and they realized that they were laced with panic.

"Garnet! Garnet!"

"Garnet, where are you?"

Immediately, Squall and Seifer turned to face each other. Even in the dark, the blond realized that Squall's face had paled and his pupils were dilated.

"Garnet..." Seifer mused, still staring at Squall. "Wait a minute... That's one of the little girls we played with down at the lake."

"Yeah," Squall answered nervously, his voice rough and disjointed. Images of the small girl in the blue dress with the curly red hair were flashing in his mind.

He suddenly felt frightened without knowing why.

"In the water! She's in the water!"

"Garnet!"

"Garnet, no!"

"Oh my god!"

"_She's drowning!"_

In the brief, bone-chilling flash of an instant as the words screamed into the darkness and their shocking meaning set in, Seifer saw that Squall's eyes flared. In the next, Squall had catapulted himself off the hood of the truck and was charging in a full blown sprint towards the water.

Seifer wasn't far behind him.

"Garnet! Garnet, please!"

"No!"

Seifer was cursing under his breath as he ran after Squall. Sharp blades of tall prairie grass were cutting into his bare legs, and he stumbled several times. Squall, however, never slowed down once, and he quickly gained a lead on the blond. Both were running as if death itself was on their heels. Panic set in as Seifer's mind fully latched into the seriousness of the situation, and he realized what was going on.

'_She's drowning. The girl is drowning. Oh, my god.'_

Finally, as they reached the lake, Seifer noted several men and women moving up and down the shoreline, some of them heading into the water.

"She's in the water!" a nearby woman wailed. "She's drowning! My daughter is _drowning_!"

Squall flung himself past her and into the lake. He ran as far as he could, before he rapidly proceeded to swim, looking for movement on the surface of the pitch black water. The darkness was broken only by the flashlights people were pointing hectically towards the lake, but it was barely enough to see. Seifer, too, had crossed into the ice cold water, and his eyes were cutting left and right, searching for a sight of the girl.

'_Shit. Holy shit. She could be anywhere. Fuck. FUCK.'_

He remembered the girl to be small, perhaps 3 or 4 years of age. They had played frisbee on the beach with her briefly during the afternoon, and he recalled that the girl's mother had scolded her several times for venturing too far out into the deeper parts of the lake.

'_Shit, w__e have to find her! We __**have **__to! She's just a kid... she's just a fuckin' kid...'_

Seifer was swimming in quick strokes, trying to look around in the vast, near impenetrable darkness. He saw Squall ahead of him, diving beneath the surface of the water several times, but returning with nothing.

'_It's freezing out here. We need to find her fast!'_

He could tell that Squall was frantic, and Seifer, too, could feel himself starting to lose his composure. He watched the brunette going under once more, staying submerged for a long time, and just as Seifer was beginning to worry about Squall's well-being, his younger companion suddenly returned, clutching something to his chest.

"Garnet! Garnet! He... he _found her_!"

Seifer's heart stilled momentarily when he realized that the thing Squall was cradling against his body was the motionless form of the missing toddler. The brunette was back-rowing rapidly towards the shore while cupping the girl's chin with his hand and attempting mouth-to-mouth at the same time, swimming with the experience and speed of someone who had been trained in water rescue.

"Squall...!"

As the blond and everyone else advanced as fast as they could towards Squall's position, Seifer watched with apprehension as the brunette finally reached solid ground. Squall was carrying the girl's limp body in his arms, then proceeded to quickly lower her into the sand, dropping to his knees next to her and bending over her seemingly lifeless form.

Seifer could hear nothing but the blood rushing in his ears when he finally reached Squall and the hysterical men and women clustered around him. He pushed them aside fiercely and without regard, but he froze to a stunned statue when he saw his companion on his knees on the ground, performing rescue breaths and chest compressions on the small, pale little girl that was laying motionless on her back in the sand.

'_My god...'_

The brunette's face was hard with concentration, his eyes glowing feverishly. He paid no attention to the parents screaming around him; his sole focus was on the little girl he had dragged out of the water. Someone seemed to be on the line with 911, but neither Squall nor Seifer took any notice of this. Trembling, Seifer crouched next to Squall's swiftly moving figure, but just as he had found his voice to ask how he could assist his friend, something finally seemed to happen.

The little girl took a few, gasping breaths and Squall recoiled, quickly turning her on her side, towards him, and he watched as she started to vomit. Seifer noticed mostly water coming from her waxy looking lips, but there seemed to be some residues of food, as well. When she was finished, Seifer noted that she was still breathing on her own, and he was overwhelmed with excitement when he saw that her eyelids were fluttering and she appeared to struggle to find her way out of her unconscious state.

"Oh, my god."

"Garnet!"

"He saved her!"

"You saved her! You saved my daughter!"

A woman flung herself on the little girl, while a man dragged Squall onto his feet and nearly crushed him in a desperate bear hug, crying like a child. Squall's wide eyes, however, were still trained on the girl, soaking up every miniscule motion that was coming from her tiny body. Seifer, who had originally stared at the red haired toddler in concern, was now fixing his gaze on Squall, who was being hugged and kissed by random people, but seemed to realize none of it.

Something wasn't right.

There was something alarming in his eyes that struck Seifer with razor-sharp intensity. Just as the blond stood up and attempted to reach out for his friend, wanting to pull him into a relieved and comforting hug, Squall suddenly swung around and ran away from the lake, towards the parking lot.

"S-Squall?" Seifer stuttered blankly, not understanding the sudden turn of the tides. "Squall, what... _Squall_!"

Panicked, the blond left the group of people behind without wasting another thought on them, and he followed a quickly retreating Squall into the pitch black darkness. He saw the brunette stumbling towards the light of the torches, towards their little picnic setup, where Squall ultimately collapsed onto his hands and knees.

"_Squall!_"

Instantly, Seifer was by his side. He watched Squall trembling and hyperventilating, gasping for air as he was clutching one hand to his chest. Worried, the blond grabbed the blanket that they had spent their picnic on earlier, and he hastily proceeded to throw it over Squall's soaking wet body.

"Squall—"

"Can't," the brunette cried in a choked, severed voice, his face ghostly pale and his lips tinged blue. "I can't... _Out_... I need to... get _out_... of here..."

This time, Seifer understood. With a few, quick movements, he had grabbed Squall and effortlessly picked him up off the dirt and grass that covered the ground beneath them. He carried Squall in his arms, away from everything that had seemed so important only minutes ago, and the brunette never put up any resistance. Seifer could still feel him shaking, despite the blanket, and his heart was throbbing agonizingly for the brunette with every step that he took. Squall's weight didn't bother him, and he continued to walk with stoic strength until he had almost reached the truck, when the dark haired boy suddenly began to struggle.

"Squall, what—"

"No," Squall groaned, fighting him harder now. "Down... let me down..."

Confused, Seifer lowered him into the grass, right near the fallen tree they had kissed at on their last visit to Cosmo Canyon. Squall was sitting on his knees with his arms clutched to his torso, every muscle in his body shivering savagely.

"Squall..."

Seifer perched down before him, studying the disturbing pallor of Squall's skin and the unnaturally bright gleam in his eyes with unadulterated, unmasked fright. It pained him to see Squall, who was normally so strong and callous, in such a hurt, vulnerable state. He couldn't comprehend why the brunette had snapped so suddenly, nor what he was seeing with that empty, unfocused gaze of his that seemed to stare right through him into nothingness.

"Squall," Seifer repeated the boy's name gently, receiving no response.

At this point, any attempts at communicating with the brunette seemed completely futile.

Squall wasn't crying, but his breathing was rough and erratic. His hair was sticking up at angles that seemed to defy all laws of gravity, and as waterlogged as it was, it looked nearly black. Normally, Seifer would have been insanely turned on by the way Squall's wet shirt and jeans were clinging to every sharply outlined muscle on his body; right now, however, the sight managed to stir nothing from him but concern.

Robbed of any more suitable means of soothing the brunette, Seifer finally wrapped his arms around the smaller teen and drew him against his chest. He could feel Squall letting out a strangled breath against his throat, and he figured that his own, wet body probably didn't offer much warmth or comfort, but right now, he had nothing else to give.

"Squall," he whispered once more, raking his hand through the tousled mess that was Squall's hair. "Squall, what's wrong? Say something. _Please_... just talk to me."

The brunette hiccoughed, then stammered, in a choked, breathless voice that was muted by his mouth being pressed against Seifer's skin, "Sister... my sister..."

"Your sister?" Seifer said, perplexed. "What about your sister?"

"My sister... she almost... she almost died... she..."

Realizing that this was beyond anything he would easily understand, Seifer edged their bodies apart and placed both of his hands flat against the sides of Squall's jaw, carefully tilting the brunette's face upwards to meet his own.

"Squall, what are you talking about?" he asked, a shade of urgency to his inflection that hadn't been there before.

Squall let out a groan, trying to turn his head away, but Seifer wouldn't allow it.

"Talk to me," he demanded, pressing his palms more firmly against Squall's icy skin. "What happened to your sister?"

"I... She... We were... I..." the brunette started, before breaking off in order to shuffle the words around and rearrange his sentence. "Three years ago, she... I... I almost killed her, I..."

"_What_?"

The brunette's teeth were chattering as he let out a hiss of air, fighting for composure that was no longer there. With the rescue of the young girl, Garnet, all the dark, painful memories he had so long suppressed and all the feelings he had blunted for years were now violently demanding recognition. There was more guilt trapped up inside of him than any ordinary teenager would ever be able to handle. He suddenly remembered that tragic accident in Trabia so very clearly, and every dream that had died that night and every nightmare that had begun were now slapping him in the face.

_'I can't do this, I can't... I **can't**...'_

"Squall, listen to me," Seifer's strong voice cut through the shadows of madness in his mind, and Squall looked up at him helplessly. "You didn't kill anyone, you understand me? You just _saved_ that little girl! You're a fuckin' _hero _if I've ever seen one!"

"No," Squall choked, screwing up his face, "No, I—"

"Tell me what happened to Ellone," Seifer cut him off. "Tell me."

"I can't... I can't... She..."

"What happened three years ago?" the blond continued to pry, trying to keep Squall's thoughts from spinning out of control once more. "Tell me, Squall. _Tell me_."

"We... I... It was winter, and... we were in Trabia, we were on vacation, we..." Squall winced, clawing his hands into his own, wet shirt, looking so incredibly hurt. "I... I took her out into the mountains... on... on a snowmobile... We... It was late, and... and I got lost... There was a snowstorm... We... We were missing for hours... She... I tried to keep her warm, but... it was cold... God, it was _so_ cold..."

"Squall..."

"It... it took the rescue squad a long time to find us," the brunette continued, the choppy words barely holding as he forced them through his ice cold lips. "By then, we... we were both... we were both unconscious. I... I woke up on the way to the hospital, but... Ellone, she... she was in a coma for days... She just... she wouldn't wake up. I... I didn't... I didn't think she was going to make it."

"Oh, Squall."

Sighing, Seifer inclined his forehead against Squall's, and his warm breath ghosted the brunette's clammy face.

"It was an accident, Squall," the blond whispered, the words so familiar to Squall's ears, and yet they sounded so different coming from the older boy's lips. "It wasn't your fault."

"But I—"

"You would _never_ harm your sister, Squall. You love her more than anything. It _wasn't_ your fault."

"It was my fault we got lost, it was my responsibility, I—"

"Stop," Seifer said, now pressing his hands into the nape of Squall's neck, trying to anchor him to reality. "You need to stop, or you're going to drive yourself insane."

"But..."

"It was an accident," the eighteen year old repeated sternly, determined to get through to his self-destructive friend. Suddenly, as he made the connection between Garnet's rescue and Squall's heart-breaking story, the brunette's behavior made so much more sense. It was truly frightening how much ridiculous guilt the dark haired teenager had been burdened with at such a young age, and how he had probably been beating himself up mentally day after day over something that had never been his fault to begin with.

'_No wonder he cuts himself... He's got so much weighing on his mind, and he never talks about any of it. He just keeps it all to himself, and this is how he deals with it. At this rate, he's gonna fuckin' kill himself.'_

"Why did you never say anything?" Seifer finally asked quietly, his forehead still resting against Squall's and his dark green eyes searching the younger boy's tight face. He could hear the brunette letting out a breath, and he could feel it brushing his own lips, which were so very close to Squall's.

"I always... would've rather forgotten," the small youth replied, his voice thick and coated as he spoke. "But I can't... I can just... make sure it never happens again. My life... was changed that night... in more ways than you will ever know. I will never... never put her in danger again."

Seifer thought that he understood the other male's reasons, and yet he felt, deep down, that he really wasn't understanding anything at all. Nevertheless, he finally leaned backwards and turned his head to the side, towards the lake, where his gaze was searching the distance as his thoughts scattered.

"You knew exactly what you were doing out there," he mused, his eyebrows lacing together as images of Squall diving into the water resurfaced. "Where did you learn how to swim like that?"

"I... took classes, after Ellone was released from the hospital," Squall sighed, sounding weary and depleted of all energy. His eyes, too, were grazing the dark horizon. "CPR, lifeguarding, water rescue, wilderness survival... I learned anything I could get my hands on. I felt so useless that night, out in the snow, in the mountains... and I never want to feel like that ever again."

"You're not useless," the blond spoke in a low, yet authoritative voice as he faced the brunette once more. "You saved that girl's life, Squall. She'd probably be dead without you. You give yourself far too little credit."

The brunette remained silent, his shadowed gaze flickering between Seifer's face and the opaque night sky. Finally, he let out a hoarse sigh, and a shiver rippled through his body.

"... I'm cold."

Seifer immediately wrapped his arms around the slender youth once more, and he rubbed his back vigorously in an attempt to restore some warmth to Squall's muscles.

"Do you wanna go back to the lake and see how they're doing?" the blond asked tentatively.

Squall shook his head almost instantly. He seemed far more composed than he had, but there was still a gleam of hurt in his slate blue orbs that wouldn't easily disappear.

"... No."

"Okay. Let's get out of here then."

Releasing Squall, Seifer gathered the blanket that had fallen to the ground into his arms and curtly draped it across the brunette's shoulders. The younger male only looked up at him out of narrowed eyes and said, in his own, absurdly stubborn way, "... I'm fine. Don't worry about me."

Seifer spared him a quick smile that was blanched of all humor, and yet full of rawest affection.

"But I do."

With that, he pulled the brunette towards his feet, steadying both of them as their aching muscles almost gave in and they threatened to lose their balance. This night was over, and the picnic they had left behind near the lake remained forgotten. Neither of them had pictured their trip to finish on such a dramatic note, but even so, Seifer was grateful for the intimate glimpse he had gained into his lover's mysterious life. And as they made their way to Seifer's truck, both of them worn out to a point of complete exhaustion, smelling of dirt and muddy lake water, the blond once more noticed the sharp flash of silver on Squall's chest, reflecting the cold light of the waning moon. His admiring, bright green eyes found the filigree lines of Squall's face, and he noticed a quiet strength there that no tragedy, no matter how profound, would ever be able to destroy.

'_... Sleeping Lion Heart, indeed.'_

* * *

29 chapters down, and definitely a few more to go :) This one was shorter in comparison than some of the others, but I hope you enjoyed it anyway. Thank you, as always, for all your ongoing support. It means the world to me.


	30. Rest in Peace

-:-  
**Chapter 30  
****Rest in Peace**

"_This whole thing confuses me as much as it confuses you."  
_-:-

I'll face myself

To cross out what I've become

Erase myself

And let go of what I've done

Put to rest

What you've thought of me

While I clean this slate

With the hands of uncertainty

"_What I've Done" – Linkin Park_

-:-

Seifer Almasy had never been a fan of Monday mornings, especially if he was supposed to waste more than half of his day at school learning virtually nothing other than how to be more efficiently bored - a skill he had already mastered a long time ago. As far as he was concerned, his senior year was a complete educational time sink. If he hadn't bothered to become a genius in the past eleven years, why in the world would he suddenly decide to start now?

Nonetheless, his mood was brighter this morning than it normally would be, if only because he had spent almost a whole weekend with his boyfriend/friend/classmate/resident sadist prick Squall Leonhart. Granted, their time together had been somewhat of an emotional cluster fuck, but Seifer was thankful for every minute he got to pass in the brunette's presence. They had math together this afternoon too, right after lunch, and even though he hadn't done his homework, Seifer was looking forward to that particular class with a silly kind of excitement, if only because it meant sitting next to Squall for a near whole two hours.

Of course, there was a less pleasant side to the concept of attending math class, too. He could still very vividly recall Rinoa Heartily's hostile outburst at his apartment on Friday night, the nasty comments she had made, and the fact that him and Squall would be facing her for the very first time since then.

'_Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if she already ran around telling everybody that Squall and I are gay. Tche. That bitch. Fuck her. Fuck all of them to the end of all fuckity fuckdom. I don't care. They can say whatever the hell they want to me, but if they dare mess with Squall, I'll punch their stupid fuckin' faces in.'_

Earlier this morning, Seifer had sent the brunette object of his desire a raunchy text message, right after waking up with a raging solid hard on, but his hopeful, horny teenage banter hadn't managed to earn him a response yet. He checked his cell phone once more as he was idling down one of the concrete paths leading past the school fountain to the science wing, but his inbox was empty.

'_Hmm... He should be awake by now. I hope he didn't oversleep or anything. I didn't hear much from him yesterday... and he was totally exhausted on Saturday. It's been a stressful weekend, I guess. I hope he didn't get sick. We were both goddamn soaked after that mess at Cosmo Canyon.'_

As he continued to walk, Seifer reminisced about Squall's heroic, selfless rescue of the young girl at Cosmo Canyon on Saturday evening. He had never seen anything like it before in real life. Squall had granted him some insight into his wounded heart that day, and Seifer would cherish that moment forever when the brunette had clung to him in misery, sobbing about his sister and the painful, guilt-drenched memories he had been keeping a secret for so long.

'_I think he's finally starting to trust me. Fuck, I can hardly believe it.'_

Seifer continued to amble down the narrow pathway with a crooked smile, typing another message on his phone while looking up briefly here and there to avoid a collision with one of the other students.

Then, out of nowhere, something in front of him suddenly solicited his attention.

Just a few feet ahead of him, near the familiar marble fountain, stood a man with his back turned towards him. Seifer couldn't even say why the male had caught his interest at all, but his bright green eyes continued to flicker from his cell phone screen to the man's broad backside. At first sight, there seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary about the guy whatsoever. He was of average height, with shoulder length, perfectly straight dark hair that he had pulled into a low pony tail. He didn't look anything like a teacher. As Seifer slowly walked past him, he noticed that the man was holding a very professional looking Nikon camera, which he was utilizing to take seemingly random photos of the school buildings. The blond veered his head around just slightly to obtain a better view of the man's face, but when he gave the man a bored once-over, he nearly dropped his cell phone in surprise.

'_... What the __**fuck**__?'_

The eighteen year old came to a screeching halt, and as his boots made a grating sound on the pavement, his mind too nearly came to a complete operational standstill.

'_You're fuckin' kidding me, right?'_

Seifer stood in a state of stunned silence, his phone still in his hand as he was trying to comprehend why on _earth_ the man behind him looked like a spitting image of none other than Squall Leonhart. Granted, the blond hadn't been able to catch a really close look of the man's face, but what he had seen had startled the shit out of him. How could that unknown, middle age man possibly have the same identical handsome facial features as his seventeen year old classmate?

'_... I don't get it. How does this make any fuckin' sense? They don't just look alike, I really thought that was Squall there for a second! What the fuck. I need to get a better look.'_

Seifer wasn't entirely sure what he was doing when he suddenly whipped around, jammed his cell phone back into his pocket and marched up to the unknown photographer. He had no concept of what exactly he was trying to accomplish by approaching the man, but his curiosity had always gotten the better of him, and today was no exception. On top of all that, he had the nagging feeling that if he'd pass on this chance encounter, he'd make a very stupid mistake.

'_Maybe I'm just seeing things... In fact, I'm almost positive that I am. Still, I gotta make sure.'_

Seifer could tell that the man had finally taken notice of him, because he was gradually lowering his camera and gave him a curious look-over. Seifer was fully aware that he was blatantly staring at the guy, but he didn't give one bit of a damn.

This was some of the most bizarre stuff he had seen in his life.

The man was taller and more solid than Squall, yet similar in his lean, athletic built. The similarities, however, did not simply end there. The photographer's narrow, attractive face looked _exactly_ like Seifer would picture his classmate to look perhaps 20 years down the road. Their resemblance was uncanny. The man's nose, his lips, his eyebrows, his bone structure... everything about him looked so strikingly similar to Squall that their resemblance could impossibly be explained away as "coincidence". The man's skin was the same pale, unblemished shade of ivory, and his eyes were a cool, grayish tint of green that sized Seifer up with a neutral sort of interest. He was dressed in a simple, light blue button down shirt and a pair of khaki slacks, looking laid back and approachable. There was a calm and quiet aura of authority that surrounded him; a look that demanded attention, yet nothing that ever seemed intended to intimidate.

All the same, Seifer had to suck in a deep, nervous breath before he eventually managed to open his mouth.

"Hey. You."

It wasn't the kind of greeting he had originally sketched out, but for the moment, it was the best he could come up with. Judging by the way the man was raising a skeptical eyebrow, Seifer's offhand approach wasn't what the guy had expected, either.

Nonetheless, the dark haired man chose to give him a disarming smile.

"Well, hi there, what's up? Can I help you?"

Seifer stopped shortly before the brunette, but he continued to stare in an almost compulsive kind of way, not once taking his eyes off the photographer. The man's expression mirrored his friendly tone of voice, but he seemed at least slightly bewildered by the teen's non-conventional approach.

"Yeah, actually, you can," Seifer said bluntly, pointing at the brown haired man's camera. "You're taking pictures of the school, right?"

The man continued to smile and rubbed the back of his head lankily, before patting his camera with a strange kind of fondness. "Yeah, I sure am. Your school is one of the nicest I've come across in my career. The architecture is amazing. You're a student here, right?"

"Yeah, got that right," the blond answered, flapping his hand impatiently. "So you're a photographer, huh?"

"Yeah, I'm a journalist and a photographer for the Esthar Times," the man explained willingly.

"Oh, really? So why are you here? What are you doing here? What's your name?"

The man gave him an amused look out of sparking green-blue eyes, obviously taken aback by Seifer's inquisitive nature, but he chose to answer regardless of the absurdity of the situation, and the smile never left his face.

If anything, the insolent boy was tickling his sense of humor.

"My name is Laguna Loire," he said in a light, pleasant voice, and the corners of his mouth were twitching. "I'm old friends with one of the teachers that works here, Kiros Seagul. We went to grad school together. I'm visiting for a few weeks, and I figured I'd take some pictures while I'm here."

"Seagul's my gym teacher," Seifer informed him immediately, but his mind seemed to work into a different direction.

Seriously, who the _hell _was this guy, and why did he look _so much_ like Squall?

Seifer could only think of one explanation right now, and quite frankly, it confused the shit out of him.

'_What if the two of them are related? I mean, seriously, if it wasn't for the age difference, they could be goddamn twins. Does Squall have any family in Esthar? He used to live there, right? At least that's what Irvine said, I think. Hey... hold on. Wait a minute. What if... What if this is...'_

"Oh, no kidding?" the man named Laguna said, chuckling now, interrupting Seifer's complex train of thought, which was so easily derailed. "Well, what do you know, I'm meeting one of Kir's students! So, say, what do ya think, does he do a good job? Huh?"

"Yeah, whatever, not bad I guess," Seifer replied distractedly, before he tilted his head and stared at Laguna as if he was trying to burn a hole into the man's forehead. "Hey, question... do you have a _kid_?"

He could see Loire's face going blank at his unexpected inquiry, and the man replied in a perplexed tone of voice, "Excuse me?"

"Nothing," Seifer answered hectically, as if he had suddenly changed his mind on something. "Anyway, do you only take pictures of shrubs and buildings and shit, or do you take pictures of people, too?"

"Uh, well," Laguna answered, looking more baffled by Seifer's behavior by the minute, "Yeah, I mean, I do portraits. Sure."

"Okay, I wanna hire you."

Again, the man raised his brows at him.

"What?"

"I wanna hire you," Seifer repeated, sounding absurdly determined. "I want you to take pictures of me and someone else."

"Well, actually, I'm not working while I'm here, I'm kind of on vacatio—"

"What, is it too much of a challenge for you to take photos of some high school kids?" Seifer interrupted him, his tone deliberately cocky.

"Uh..."

'_What on earth is it with kids these days?' _the man thought in disbelief as he looked the tall blond up and down. The teen had attitude to boot, and his behavior was just a little bit out there, but Laguna Loire had never been one to back down from a challenge.

Sighing, he balanced his weight on his right foot, placed his hands on his hips and said vaguely, "Well, I suppose I could take some time and—"

"Awesome," Seifer cut him off instantly, leaving the man little room to argue. "Oh, and just so you know, I don't care what it costs."

"Oh," Laguna responded flatly, giving him an estranged look. "Right."

As he watched the satisfied smirk settling on the handsome blond teenager's face, however, he couldn't help but wonder.

"Okay, so tell me," he said, regarding Seifer with a secretive grin. "What's so important about these pictures? Oh, wait! I know, I get it... You want me to take pictures of you and your girlfriend, right? Right? That's what this is about, isn't it?"

"Not quite, Sherlock," Seifer shot back icily, and he didn't know why he felt as daring as he did, but something about the current situation seemed so profound to him that he thought it unwise to lie. "I want you to take pictures of me and my _boy_friend."

Again, the man's expression became completely vacant, and for a few long, awkward moments, he seemed to look for an appropriate response. When it didn't come to him, he finally laughed in an off-pitch voice, "Oh! Oh, okay. Boyfriend. Right. Okay. Yeah. That's, well, that's great, I... uh, yeah."

Seifer could tell that the man was uncomfortable with the situation, and he asked sharply, "What?"

"Nothing, nothing!" Laguna attempted to reassure him quickly, and the pleasant smile reappeared on his face as he raised his hands in a soothing manner. "That's great, not a problem at all. I'll be happy to do it. I enjoy taking pictures of couples, actually."

"Alright then," Seifer said, sounding placated. "Do you have a business card or something so I can give you a call and set this up?"

"Yes, sure, just one second..."

The man fished through the pocket of his khaki pants and retrieved a plain white business card with dark blue lettering that he handed to the blond. Seifer examined it closely, reading over the man's name and phone number several times as if trying to memorize them, before slipping the card into his jeans pocket.

"Alright, thanks," Seifer said, turning around with a nonchalant wave of his right hand. "I'll give you a ring later."

"Sure, okay," Laguna muttered as the blond was already walking away from him, not minding him with another word or gesture. He simply disappeared among the hectic throng of students filing into the school building, acting as if nothing out of the unusual had just taken place.

"What in the world..." the photographer murmured to himself as he unsurely scratched his temple. "What an odd kid."

Shaking his head, it was all Laguna Loire could do but wonder what exactly it was he had just gotten himself into. He didn't know how, and he didn't understand why, but for some reason, he couldn't get rid of the feeling that there was a deeper meaning to the conversation he had just held with this weird young man. That sense of premonition was strange and persistent, like an itch in the back of his mind that he couldn't reach. He didn't even know the boy's name, let alone his intentions, but he had a notion that his trip to Deling City had suddenly become anything but ordinary.

* * *

"Squall! Hey, Squall! Wait up! _Squall_! Goddammit, Squall, wait the _fuck _up!"

The lean brunette teenager in the faded blue jeans and black leather jacket, who had been trudging down one of Deling City High School's many hallways looking completely unperturbed, suddenly swung around so sharply that the backpack he had been carrying on one shoulder nearly knocked another student clean off his feet. Squall's face was pale and irritable, and his eyes glowered in an infuriated shade of gray as he let out a pissed off grunt.

"What the _shit_ are you yelling for?" the brunette shouted back over the heads of a group of students as he placed both of his hands on his hips and glared down the hallway at his tall blond classmate, Seifer, who was jogging towards him excitedly.

"Aww, I missed you too, sweetheart," Seifer snickered with a husky touch of sarcasm as he came to a halt before the shorter brunette, beaming at him fondly. He hadn't seen Squall nor heard from him all day, and he had even spent his whole lunch break without him.

Honestly, he had been starting to feel just a tiny little bit deprived.

Squall, on the other hand, looked quite repulsed at Seifer's very noisy and very _public_ display of boyish affection. Just as the blond reached out to ruffle his hair or do something else annoying along those lines, the brunette quickly drew back his leg and gave Seifer a nice, cheerful kick in the shins.

"Don't even _think_ about touching me," Squall warned in his own, charmingly hateful way, and for a moment, he relished the sight of Seifer hopping around on one leg while howling like a little girl.

"What the fuck? Shit, princess, that fuckin' hurt!" Seifer yelped, screwing his face into a pained grimace that seemed to elicit little pity from his opposite.

"Yeah, breaks my heart too," the brunette snorted, while scowling grouchily at a few other students passing by when they dared to slow down just enough to enjoy the show.

"Seriously, Squall, you might have to take me to the infirmary!" Seifer tried in a hopeful pitch, while he vigorously rubbed his injured leg with one hand. "I may require some mouth-to-mouth, too..."

Squall merely rolled his eyes and turned halfway around to proceed towards their math classroom, muttering with a wealth of sarcasm to his voice, "Thanks, I'll pass, but I'll go get your wife Irvine for you."

"Whoa, _hey_, no thanks!" Seifer objected swiftly, and he instantly straightened up and grabbed a hold of Squall's arm to keep him from walking away.

"Yeah, that's what I thought," the brunette replied simply, but there was an impish, amused glint in his frost blue eyes as he glanced at Seifer from over his shoulder.

"You're a heartless little bastard," Seifer mocked him in a good natured way, before he proceeded to smack the back of Squall's head playfully.

"Have some fucking cheese with your whine and tell me something I _don't_ know," Squall drawled, sounding entirely unimpressed while he casually readjusted the position of his backpack on his shoulder.

He completely missed the sudden flash of secretive excitement in Seifer's eyes.

"... Oh, yeah?" Seifer sang smugly. "Well, guess what, princess, here's a lil somethin'-somethin' you didn't know: I got a surprise for you."

With that, Seifer simply strode past the brunette with an air of pompous importance and headed straight for their math class. Squall, who was taken aback for just one second too long, cocked his head to the side and barked, "Huh? Hey! What? What do you mean?"

When Seifer continued to strut on without hesitation, Squall hissed a few colorful curses under his breath, before hoisting his book bag further onto his shoulder and going after the blond.

"Hey, wait! What the hell do you mean, you have a surprise for me?" the dark haired boy pried when he had caught up with Seifer and glared at him from the side suspiciously. "What the fuck are you up to?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?" Seifer snickered, winking at the brunette in a disturbingly mischievous way.

"Well, tell me!" Squall ordered, trying his very best to sound stern.

"Ah, 'fraid I can't do that," the blond said dramatically, before giving Squall a playful pinch in the side and lilting with a seductive undertone, "Don't worry, though, I think you're gonna like it."

"If it's something perverted, count me out," the brunette snarled, pushing Seifer's hand away with an expression of distaste.

"You know, that idea would _never_ cross my innocent little mind!" the blond purred.

"Bull-fucking-shit!"

"Aw, come on, you know I'd never touch you in a perverted way!" the blond tried to convince him, before a naughty chuckle gave him away. "Well, okay, if you'll beat me to it..."

"Get away from me!" Squall warned, swatting Seifer's hand away once more, which had steadily been creeping towards his butt cheek.

Seifer couldn't help but let out a laugh, yet when he spoke, it was in a more reassuring tone. "Seriously, Squall, it's nothing perverted, I promise you. I'll show you tonight, after school. Just be patient, okay?"

Squall regarded him with a long, skeptical gaze from the side, but finally, he scrunched up his nose and said with hesitation, "Okay... Just don't get any funny ideas."

With those words, Squall disappeared inside their classroom, not seeing how Seifer's features suddenly became hard. He couldn't know that the older blond had spent the earlier part of the day brooding on the topic of the photographer named Laguna Loire, and his possible connection to Squall. Granted, Seifer had considered the option that Loire's physical resemblance to the teen was purely coincidental. In all reality, he could quite possibly be seeing things, and to someone else, Laguna and Squall might not look one bit alike.

Deep down, however, Seifer knew better than that.

His mind seemed to revolve around the one, very much implausible concept that his boyfriend Squall and the unknown journalist from Esthar were in some way related to each other. Seifer hadn't forgotten the fact that Kato Kearan was not Squall's biological father, and it opened up a whole world of possibilities. Seifer wondered now, more than ever, whether the brunette even knew who his father really was. It was a valid question and a touchy subject, and Seifer knew that if he'd ask or say the wrong thing, Squall would be insufferable for the rest of the fucking month. Once he was truly upset, Squall wasn't easily appeased, and since Seifer really wanted for the brunette and Laguna to meet, he decided to avoid the topic for the time being. He had already called the journalist and set up a meeting at Ward's Diner for the evening to discuss the pictures, and Laguna had offered to bring one of his portfolios for ideas.

In his sometimes naïve set of mind, Seifer figured that all he had left to do now was to make sure that Squall would show up.

As the blond readjusted his focus back to the classroom, he noticed that his brunette friend had already made his way to the back of the room and sat down. Seifer, however, decided to carefully sweep the rows of seats with his eyes. He gave a quick smirk as his gaze passed over Irvine, who was raising a lazy hand in greeting. To Seifer, the cowboy still looked quite hung over.

Then, his watchful green eyes came to rest on Rinoa Heartily's regular table.

The girl's seat, however, was empty.

'_Huh... that's weird. What the fuck? I don't think she's ever been late for class. Where the hell is she? Did I crush her ego __**that**__ much that she decided to skip class? Hah. Oh well. Suits me just fine. The less bullshit to deal with, the better.'_

Looking content, he made his way to the very back of the classroom, where Squall was already waiting. He noticed the brunette's sharp blue eyes on himself, although Squall was pathetically trying to hide it.

'_He's hot for me. Yup. Always knew it.'_

As Seifer sank into his seat with an air of self-satisfaction, he scanned the classroom once more, before turning to his friend.

"Hey, where's what's-her-face?" he asked in a low tone of voice, eliciting a frown from Squall's end. "Ya know... Rinoa."

"I don't know," Squall snorted with his teeth pushed firmly together, while retrieving his books from his bag and laying them down before him stiffly. "Nor do I give a flying fuck."

Seifer thought that he could detect a smidge of jealousy in Squall's snide tone, but although the concept pleased him on all sorts of levels, he decided not to bring it up.

Frankly, there were more important things on his mind right now.

"So, are you working this afternoon?" he asked, his face turned towards Squall with interest.

"No," the brunette replied, pausing as he methodically placed a few pens on the table in front of him. "I promised Mom I'd pick Ell up from day care. Her and Kato have some kind of meeting at work that she can't miss."

"Do you need me to give you a ride?" Seifer offered immediately. "You don't have a car, right?"

"No, but my Mom has a second car she doesn't drive much," Squall elaborated, and there was a hint of repulsion to his voice that Seifer didn't pick up on. "She usually drives the minivan. Her other car is a Mercedes that Kato gave her. I'll just take that."

"I see... Well, do you think you can make it to Ward's around 8pm?" Seifer inquired, trying very hard to sound casual.

"Ward's?" Squall repeated skeptically, tilting his head. "Why?"

"I can't tell you. I just need you to be there around 8pm."

Squall lowered his brows and continued to glare at the other male warily. "You're acting weird."

"It's a surprise, that's all," Seifer attempted to assure him, knowing how easily his classmate was put on edge. "Ya think you can make it, or do I need to make changes to my plans?"

Seifer saw the open mistrust in Squall's finely featured face. The dark haired boy seemed to hesitate for a long time, absorbing every miniscule bit of information and gauging Seifer's intentions with great consideration, before he finally decided to nod tentatively.

"No... I can make it."

"Good," Seifer said contently as a smile leaked across his face, and he settled lower in his seat. He still felt the brunette's eyes on him, and he regarded the younger male with a fleeting wink.

"Don't worry, princess," he whispered, trying to persuade the brunette to relax, before turning his head aside and saying nothing further.

Squall continued with persistence to attempt to read Seifer's mind, and he didn't give up until Edea Kramer, their teacher, finally entered the room and commenced their lesson. Her lecture quickly left Seifer in a state situated somewhere between comatose stupor and teenage rapture over the beautiful sight to his left. He was downright fascinated by the image of Squall half-listening, half-spacing out as he drew quick, random doodles on a blank sheet of notebook paper, never too distracted to miss just a single one of Edea's mind-splittingly difficult questions.

'_... Smart lil fucker. How did I deserve him again? Oh, right - I'm pretty much the shit. Hmm... then again, maybe I'm really just one lucky son of a bitch.'_

And with those pleasing thoughts in mind, Seifer lazily dozed off.

* * *

It was nearly 8 o'clock in the evening when Seifer made his way to Ward's Diner for the meeting he had arranged with Laguna Loire and Squall. The last time he had seen his hot classmate had been after math class, when the brunette had graciously taken it upon himself to kick him out of his chair in order to wake him up.

'_Yeah, wasn't that just fuckin' darling of him?__'_ Seifer thought to himself with sarcasm as he held his aching left thigh, which was probably imprinted with the bottom of Squall's foot. Meanwhile, he was slowly ascending the set of wooden stairs to the diner's front door. Honestly, part of him was wondering just what the hell he was trying to accomplish here. He knew next to nothing about this Laguna Loire guy, other than the man's profession and the fact that he looked like he shared a good bit of DNA with the ice princess Leonhart.

'_I'm probably imagining all of this. The fact that they look so much alike could be nothing but a weird optical illusion. Chances are, this is all in my mind. The real question is though... what if it** is****n't**?'_

He paused as his hand reached for the door handle to push it open. Quite truthfully, he really hadn't thought this plan through to the end. He almost felt as if he was rushing into things. He had met this man mere hours ago, and he was already planning on introducing him to Squall? For a moment, he wondered just what the hell he was thinking. Then again, Seifer had never been a man of plans; he generally handled events as they occurred, improvising on the go as he saw necessary. The blond figured that since said habit had served him fairly well so far, why should it fail him tonight?

'_Everything's gonna be fine. This is just a little meet and greet, that's all. I just kinda wanna see them both next to each other and make sure they really do look as similar as I think they do. Then we'll just kinda go from there. That Loire dude seems like a decent guy, anyway. And if nothing else, I'll at least get some more awesome pictures of Squall out of it.'_

As Seifer entered the diner, he immediately stopped questioning his own intentions when he saw Laguna, Kiros and Ward perched on a few stools by the bar, drinking what looked like a couple of cold beers and munching on steaming baskets of breaded shrimp and onion rings. Seifer was mildly surprised to see his gym teacher, although he recalled Loire mentioning their friendship earlier in the day. This, of course, made him wonder whether Kiros, too, had noticed the physical similarities between Laguna and Squall before, although he figured that the dark skinned teacher probably wouldn't even pick up on something trivial like that. Seifer, for his part, had been told many a times that his mother looked like a certain gorgeous big screen actress, but he himself had never thought that there was any kind of resemblance at all.

'_Maybe it all depends on what you're used to... or how closely you're looking__. And I doubt that anyone's looked at Squall as closely as I have.'_

Shrugging, he buried his hands inside the pockets of his fashionably distressed blue jeans and ambled over towards the bar. Ward was the first to spot him, and he raised one huge hand in greeting.

"Seifer!" the man thundered in his loud, good natured voice, causing the other two men to turn around on their chairs. "Come here, boy."

With a lazy half-smirk, Seifer stepped up to the three males, who were so radically different in height and size.

"Hey, wassup?" he lilted, nodding in Kiros' direction. "Didn't know you'd be here, too."

His gym teacher chuckled at the boy's casual greeting.

"No need to be so surprised. Laguna, Ward and I have been best friends since grad school. We served two years in the military together, too," Kiros explained, ignoring Seifer's lack of respect for authority for the moment being. "Laguna just got into town today. We were actually havin' some beers and doing some catching up."

"That's cool," Seifer replied graciously, while chancing a glimpse at Laguna out of the corner of his eyes. In jeans and a simple white long sleeve cotton shirt he looked more like Squall than ever. Of course, the lines of his face were sharper and his eyes weren't exactly the same color, but their resemblance was as clear to Seifer as it had been a few hours ago.

'_What if they really __**are **__related?' _Seifer thought to himself, feeling a sudden sharp thud in his chest. _'Is this gonna be a good thing? Fuck, what if this dude is Squall's __**father**__? Holy shit. That would be fuckin' crazy! I'm not sure Squall would be real excited about being introduced to his old man. But what else am I supposed to do? Ignore the fact that this could possibly be Squall's father and pretend I never ran into him? ... I can't do that.'_

"So, who's the other kid we're waiting on?" Laguna asked in a manner of curiosity, wisely leaving out the fact that he knew they were waiting on Seifer's significant other. The blond noticed a shiny black leather folder that Laguna had placed on the bar in front of him, and Seifer figured that it had to be the man's portfolio.

"He should be here any minute," Seifer said absent-mindedly, while looking over his shoulder towards the door.

"You're not waitin' on Squall, are ya?" Ward guessed, causing Seifer to flinch lightly and give him a hesitant glance from the side.

For the first time, it occurred to him that he probably should have chosen a different location to set up a first meeting between Squall and Laguna. He had simply figured that the brunette would be more comfortable in an environment that was familiar to him, rather than some random restaurant full of strangers.

"Well..." he started awkwardly, but the rest of his sentence became redundant when the door to Ward's Diner opened once more, admitting a quiet, lean framed brunette in boots, dark blue jeans and a white long sleeved t-shirt. Seifer noticed immediately that the handsome teenager's expression was guarded. Squall was haphazardly raking his left hand through his tousled dark hair, and his storm blue eyes were scanning the restaurant with nervous anticipation.

"Squall!" Seifer called out, his smile immediately warming up with fondness. The three men were watching his reaction with interest, chuckling quietly to themselves. Really, Seifer's affection for the brunette teen couldn't possibly have been more obvious. It was a new discovery to Kiros and Laguna, of course, but Ward had secretly been watching over the boys' budding relationship for a while now.

That said, he'd never admit that he had asked Selphie to keep him updated on any new developments between the two hot-blooded love birds, one of which he cared for like a second son.

Squall's head flicked up when he heard his name being called, and his wandering eyes found Seifer's. Looking cautious, as if he expected something bad to happen, the brunette slowly trotted over to the bar. He noticed Kiros and Ward sitting by Seifer's side, which confused him, as well as another male that Squall had never seen before. There was something odd about that unknown man with the long, dark brown hair and piercing blue-green eyes, but Squall couldn't quite put his finger on it. Then again, he wasn't in the mood to think about it, anyway. His whole mental energy was spent on trying to figure out what in the world Seifer had planned for him.

"You're right on time," the blond teenager announced happily, and Squall noticed how Seifer's eyes darted fleetingly from himself to the dark haired man who was sitting beside Kiros. It irritated Squall, but the exact reason why was lost on him for the moment being.

"Yeah, I had to drop Ellone off first," the dark haired youth said distractedly, acknowledging his teacher and his boss with a polite nod, before he crossed his arms in front of his chest and cocked his head expectantly. "So what's up?"

"Eh... Well, like I said, I have a surprise for you, but, uhh... first I wanna introduce you to someone," Seifer said lankily, taking a half-step back to motion towards Laguna, who readily stood up from his chair to offer his hand to Squall.

"Hey there, nice to meet you. My name's Laguna Loire," the photographer introduced himself in a warm, sociable tone of voice. He noticed the hesitation in the good looking teenager's face as he reluctantly accepted his handshake, and it immediately piqued Laguna's interest.

Just why exactly did that dark haired kid look so uneasy?

"Squall Leonhart," the boy replied inattentively, his interest already fading. Then, he looked up at Seifer, crossing his arms once more.

Before Seifer could have said anything further to explain the situation, however, Laguna suddenly cut in, exclaiming, "Hey, wait a sec... I'm sorry, did you say your last name was _Leonhart_?"

Both Squall and Seifer looked back at the man, but while the brunette's expression was one of emptiness and confusion, the blond's eyes had widened hopefully.

"Yeah," Squall answered slowly, giving the man a skeptical, lowbrow look. "That's what I said."

"No kidding," Laguna said, looking happily taken aback as he placed both of his hands on his hips. His eyes were glowing with excitement that Squall did not understand. "I used to know someone by that last name! My high school sweetheart's name was Raine Leonhart. Come to think of it, kid, you actually kind of look like her. You don't happen to be from Balamb, do you?"

As Seifer held in a breath, he didn't once take his eyes off Squall. The brunette's expression went blank, and he stared at the dark haired man in front of him in stunned silence.

"... What?" Squall finally asked, stone faced and in a hoarse, low voice. "What did you say?"

"Oh, eh, well..." Laguna stammered, obviously thrown off guard by the teenager's thunderstruck expression. "I was just saying that you look a lot like an old girlfriend of mine from Balamb, Raine Leonhart. Her and I dated for a long time... until I went off to college, in fact! You don't happen to be related, do you? The last name Leonhart is kind of unusual, and like I said, you look a lot like her. Mind you, I haven't seen her in almost 18 years, but—"

Before Laguna could have finished that sentence, Squall had blown out a sharp breath and abruptly whipped around towards Seifer. The blond immediately noticed the change in Squall's temper, and he didn't like it one bit. The brunette's jaw was trembling with anger, and there was a dark, violent spark glowering in the boy's eyes as he spat irately, "What the _fuck_ is this?"

"Uh... Squall, I—" Seifer started, but he was cut off almost instantly.

"Do you consider this a practical fucking _joke_?"

"No, I—" the blond tried, swallowing against the dryness in his mouth, feverishly looking for the right thing to say as he himself was overwhelmed by thoughts and emotions rushing to his head.

In all this time, and through all their arguments, he had never seen Squall this pissed off.

"You dumb _fuck_, this isn't _funny_! What the fuck is wrong with you?" Squall hissed, his voice swaying with anger and hurt. As Seifer's pulse went soaring, the brunette turned on his heel and snarled acidly, "I've had enough of this shit! Go play your jokes on someone else!"

Instead of trying to explain his intentions, Seifer instinctively reached out for the brunette's shoulder to stop him, but Squall furiously yanked his arm back and bolted for the exit. Within seconds, Seifer's hastily constructed plan had fallen to pieces, and by the look on everyone's faces, nobody had any remote understanding of what the hell had just happened.

For a moment, Seifer felt as if he was going to vomit.

"Shit... oh, _shit_. Shit. _Shit_."

"Seifer, what—" Kiros attempted to demistify the abrupt perplexity of the situation, all the while watching through the glass door how Squall ran down the front steps towards the street.

"What did I say?" Laguna interrupted his old friend, looking at Seifer with a concerned expression. "Did I say something wrong? Did I offend him somehow? What's going on?"

The blond, however, had more meaningful things to worry about. The instant he had composed himself enough to follow Squall outside, he did precisely that. He ran with fast, thudding steps through the restaurant and out the door, but by the time he had reached the sidewalk, he couldn't make out a glimpse of Squall in the darkness, only a set of rear brake lights disappearing swiftly towards the far end of the road.

"_FUCK_!" Seifer cursed, slamming his fist against his forehead hard enough for it to hurt. As he continued to cuss under his breath, turning in circles on the spot and helplessly trying to determine what to do next, he heard someone stepping up behind him.

"Seifer," he heard Laguna's low, baritone voice calling his name, "Seifer, what in the world just happened?"

The tall blond turned around towards him, looking shocked and exasperate. He watched the man walking slowly down the stairs, shrugging into a black peacoat, and again, he was slapped in the face with Laguna's striking and unsettling resemblance to his upset lover.

Seifer groaned.

"I can't believe this," he grunted furiously. "I never meant for it to go like this... What the _hell_ was I thinking?"

Laguna looked back at him in confusion, making an unsure grimace.

"Look... What's going on here? What is all this about?" the journalist asked, gesturing towards the street. "Why was your friend so angry? Is he always this short-tempered?"

"He _is_, but this is different," Seifer explained, his voice flat and strained as he shook his head. "You don't understand."

"Then explain it to me," Laguna encouraged him. "I wanna know what I did wrong."

"You didn't do anything _wrong_, it just..."

"What?"

Sighing, Seifer ran his right hand through his gelled back hair, taking in a gritty, tense breath as he glared at the oblivious man in front of him.

His voice was raw when he spoke.

"... His _mother's_ name is Raine."

He watched how Laguna's eyes widened, and the man leaned backwards just slightly, staring at Seifer in obvious bewilderment.

"What?" he repeated.

"Raine Leonhart," Seifer explained impatiently. "Your high school sweetheart's name. That's his _mother_'s name! And I think she's from Balamb. She went to _high school_ there."

"You aren't serious," Laguna laughed, but his voice was slightly off pitch.

"I'm dead fuckin' serious," Seifer growled. "Shit... This wasn't at all what I had in mind. If I had known this, then... ugh."

"Seifer, I'm sorry, but I still don't understand," the man with the long, dark hair added slowly. "Are you saying I may or may not know his mother and that's why he got upset? That makes no sense. This was eighteen years ago."

"I'm not saying anything," the blond bit back. "But fact is that you dated someone who has the same weird name as Squall's mother, someone who's from the same town as her, and you look to be around her age... Take that for what it's worth, but to be honest, the only reason I ever talked to you to begin with was because you and Squall look like you took a plunge in the same fuckin' gene pool!"

"Okay, wait, hold on, slow down," Laguna interrupted him, looking completely overwhelmed now. He was gesticulating warily and was obviously having a difficult time following Seifer's erratic train of thought. Finally, he took a slow, calming breath, brought one hand to his face in deep thought and asked very pointedly, "Seifer. Squall's mother... do you know what she looks like?"

Wordlessly, Seifer reached into his back pocket and pulled out his leather wallet. With a stern, yet infuriated look, he retrieved one of the pictures he had taken of Squall and his mother, right before the Homecoming dance. He jabbed it towards Laguna, who was standing a few feet away from him, holding it out for the man to grasp.

"Here," the teenager said with a tight, unsettled inflection. "That's her."

"Let me see," Laguna said quietly as he took the picture from Seifer and held it to his eyes.

Seifer studied the man's face very closely as his gaze roved over the photograph, taking in every single little detail with greatest deliberation. For a long time, the blond waited in vain for a visible reaction from the journalist. Only after the man had stared at the image of Squall and Raine for what seemed like hours, Seifer finally noticed that Laguna's eyes had somehow become brighter, with a distinct, emotional sheen to them, and his expression had softened. He looked as if he had suddenly remembered something precious to him that had lain dormant for many, many years.

"She has a son," Laguna said, his voice barely a whisper. There was awe there that words could never explain. "Christ, I had no idea."

"Yeah, well," Seifer snorted harshly, but broke off.

Suddenly, Laguna veered his head around at him, frowning slightly. "... Who's the kid's father?"

Seifer merely gave the man a pregnant look, but said nothing. The wind was blowing cold through the streets now, cutting into his arms that were bare because he was wearing only a black t-shirt. His startling green eyes held so much unspoken emotion, yet gave away so little.

Even if he had wanted to talk, he wouldn't have known what to say.

"Seifer?" Laguna asked hopefully, not picking up on the boy's silent insinuation.

"I don't know!" Seifer snapped back, sounding immensely frustrated all of a sudden as he swiped one hand out into the darkness. "I have no fuckin' idea who is father is, okay? I don't even think _Squall_ knows. Honestly, I don't think the bastard was ever a part of his life."

He watched Laguna's brows riding low over his eyes while the man threw another unsure, probing glance at the photograph. Seifer could see that there was something on his mind.

"... How old is Squall, exactly?" Laguna inquired very slowly, trying to operate his voice on a neutral level.

"He's seventeen."

Seifer looked back at the man, wondering if he had bothered to do the math. When Laguna simply stared at him with an alienated expression, the blond let out a sigh and asked, as if talking to a child, "When was the last time you saw Raine?"

"Well... It's been... eighteen years, just about," Laguna murmured with a pensive inflection, the words trailing off. "It was Christmas... almost eighteen years ago..."

"Did you and her... _you know_?" Seifer asked suggestively, while performing a few provocative and unambiguous hand gestures.

Laguna, who was no longer even fazed by the blond teenager's insolent attitude, merely shrugged one shoulder vaguely and said, "Well, yes... we were young and in love, she was a senior in high school and I was a freshman in college... things just kind of happened."

"I see," Seifer responded in a noncommittal tone, before falling silent once more.

"Listen... I'm still not entirely sure what exactly is going on here, but if Squall is really Raine's son, then I need to talk to him," Laguna said suddenly, a gleam of determination burning in his eyes that hadn't been there before. "Seifer, where do you think he went?"

"Eh... I'm not sure," the blond teenager admitted, before something in his face lit up. "But... I think I have a pretty good idea."

Then, he turned around halfway and eagerly motioned towards his bright red pickup truck, which was parked by the curb.

"Follow me," he ordered. "I'll drive us."

"... Alright," Laguna agreed nearly instantly, before he willingly followed Seifer to his vehicle and climbed inside. Thoughts and emotions long forgotten were scattering within the journalist's mind, crowding to the surface of the present as he buckled up and the two of them took off towards the highway. Neither of them uttered a single word until they had been driving for nearly ten minutes.

"Seifer," the dark haired man finally broke the stiff silence between them, while swiping the blond high school student a strange gaze from the side. The man's expression was entirely unreadable. "How long have you known Squall?"

"Not very long," Seifer admitted, his eyes trained on the dark road ahead of him. "I only just moved to Deling City this summer."

"And the two of you are dating?" Laguna asked carefully, but without judgment in his voice.

"Yeah," the eighteen year old said gruffly, darting the man a warning look that was entirely unnecessary.

"And he's never told you anything about his father?"

"No," Seifer said, sounding strained. "It's a sore subject."

"I see," Laguna muttered, disappointment evident in the words.

"You know, Squall actually has a stepfather," the blond revealed, and he grimaced at the memory of the unpleasant man. "Raine's married to a guy named Kato now. They have a little daughter together. She's Squall's half-sister. Her name is Ellone."

"Really?" the journalist asked, and Seifer could tell that the coloring of his voice had changed to something less subtle and far less content. He almost looked as if he hadn't even considered the possibility that Raine might not be single. "How long have they been married?"

"No idea. I think they got married when Squall was in middle school, but I'm not sure. You'd have to ask _him _that. All I know is that Raine's husband and Squall don't get along. I only met the guy once, but he seemed like a royal dick bag."

Laguna scratched his chin, before giving an offhand, "Well, that's no good."

"Yeah. I'm not quite sure what the guy's deal is. Squall won't really talk about him. In all honesty, he doesn't like to talk about his family or anything else related to his personal life, for that matter," Seifer stated, sounding very frustrated with the situation. "You saw him. He snaps at the drop of a fuckin' dime. I try not to pry too much if I can help it, but..."

"But?"

Seifer kneaded the leather of the steering wheel with his hands, looking uncomfortable. Finally, he let out a sound of exasperation.

"Alright, look... I think... I think you have a pretty good concept of what I was thinking when I first saw you. You and Squall look... way too much alike. Honestly, it freaked the shit out of me when I first saw you. Now, add on top of that the fact that Squall doesn't know who his biological father is, and... well, it just made me curious, you could say. That's why... I wanted you and Squall to meet. I wanted to figure out if there was any kind of connection between the two of you. No more, no less. Fuck, at that point I didn't even know that you used to date his _mother_! I had no idea! Maybe it's my fault... maybe I should have asked you," Seifer admitted with a groan. "I guess when it comes down to it, I really had no idea what the fuck I was doin'."

To the blond's appreciation, Laguna did not pretend that he had no inclination of what Seifer was hinting at. He merely sat there, looking out of the window at the houses flying by with a distant, serious expression. His resemblance to Squall was truly uncanny, especially in this moment of quiet solitude. The man knew Squall's mother, intimately so, and Seifer figured that there was probably a lot more to their relationship than the man had let on so far.

"How long did you and Raine date each other, anyway?" the eighteen year old finally decided to ask, deliberately stirring Laguna from his musings.

Lately, he'd become surprisingly efficient at diffusing other people's sinister moods.

Laguna shifted slightly in his seat before answering.

"Well... Raine and I met in high school, when she was a freshman and I was a sophomore. We started dating almost right away, and we were practically inseparable for nearly four years," the man explained. "That girl had me completely wrapped around her finger, I tell you. I would've done anything for her, anything to make her smile. A lot of people would have probably called it puppy love, but for me, it was much more than that."

Seifer tilted his head, looking very intrigued now. "What the hell happened? You sound like you really liked her."

"I did. Believe me, I did. But... after I graduated high school, I moved to Esthar to study journalism, and... things kind of changed," the journalist answered indistinctly, regret swaying in every note. "I couldn't tell you what happened, exactly, and believe me, I spent a long time trying to figure it out. I came home to Balamb for Christmas to visit her during her senior year. Everything seemed fine to me. I thought we were happy. Honestly, I was just waiting for her to finish high school so she could move to Esthar with me and go to college. That had always been my plan. But then, next thing you know, I got a letter from her when I went back to school, telling me that she wants me to move on with my life and pursue my dreams without her, and that I would never hear from her again. She made truth of her words, and to this day, I don't understand what went wrong between us. There was no fight, no argument... it all just fell apart for no reason."

Seifer could almost feel the man's bitterness as if it was his own. He realized that he was clawing in an old wound that had probably never fully healed, but for the sake of Squall and his mother, he had to keep digging for the truth, no matter how painful it would be.

If it was really possible that this man was Squall's father, he had a lot of explaining to do.

"Why didn't you try to talk to her? You know, try to talk her out of it?" the blond teen asked carefully. "I mean, you loved her, right?"

"More than anything," Laguna sighed, sounding strangely defeated. "Granted, we were young, but from the moment I first laid eyes on her, I knew I wanted to grow old with her. I'm sure that sounds corny to a guy your age, but I think you'll understand when you get older."

Seifer twisted his gaze to the side without a word, suddenly confronted with the unsettling gravity of his own emotions. He had never made it a habit to plan his future too far ahead, but the thought of Squall not being a part of his life a few months or years down the road caused his throat to tighten. There was so much he wanted to do with the brunette, so many things he wanted to see together. He wanted to take Squall to the end of the world and back. In his own naivety, he had never once considered that Squall's presence might someday vanish from his life. In such a short amount of time, he had grown so accustomed to having the grumpy brunette around that it truly scared the shit out of him.

"Why did you let her go?" Seifer asked once more, wanting to add a scathing, 'What's wrong with you?', but choosing not to.

"It wasn't really my choice to make," the dark haired photographer answered. "I went back home to talk her out of the breakup, but she had already dropped out of school and left town without any word on where she was staying or what she was doing. Her parents were acting very strange, telling me that it was all my fault, and that they never wanted to see my face in Balamb again. They never explained to me what the hell I had supposedly done wrong. I figured I must have hurt Raine's feelings somehow, but I had no clue what I had done. I still don't."

"I see," Seifer replied disjointedly. He suddenly recalled the scarce bits of information that Squall had once given him about his childhood; how his mother had been driven out of the house by her own parents, only because she'd been pregnant and refused to get an abortion.

Somehow, everything was gradually coming together now.

"It was a weird situation, and looking back at it, it seems even weirder to me now," Laguna grimaced. "None of it ever made any sense to me. I even hired a private eye to try and find Raine, but without success. Eventually... I just kind of gave up. I finally realized she didn't _want_ to be found."

"Why would she drop out of school during her senior year, though?" the blond mused as he was driving, pretending to have no inkling of what had motivated Raine's escape. "She must have had some pretty significant reasons, I'd think."

"Raine was always very unconventional and free spirited, and she was a girl of many talents," Laguna spoke softly, but Seifer could have picked up on the admiration in his tone from a mile afar. "She was smart, independent, beautiful, a gifted dancer, and she could sing like no other girl I ever met. The world and _I_ would've been at her feet if only she had allowed us to be. Honestly, for a while I thought that she had met somebody else, or that she had run off to become famous, although in all truth, none of that had ever really seemed like her."

"... What if she ran off to have a _baby_?"

Seifer noticed how every muscle in the man's body flinched, but he figured that he had only spoken out loud what both of them were already thinking, anyway.

This wasn't the time to be timid and beat around the bush.

"Honestly... that thought never even crossed my mind," Laguna replied very slowly, choosing his words with utmost care, "... Until today."

Seifer tried to think of something at least distantly constructive to say, but even in his head, none of it sounded right. This whole situation had gone far out of hand, and he had never fathomed that him and Laguna Loire would even be having this absurd conversation. Of course, he had always wanted to gain insight to Squall's mysterious home life, and introducing Laguna to the brunette had originally seemed like a fantastic idea, but in all honesty, he wasn't sure that he was prepared for the consequences of his own actions.

'_I may have bitten off more than I can chew...'_

"Seifer," the journalist interrupted him, watching as the blond navigated the truck off the paved road and into a dimly lit parking lot. "I really want to talk to Raine, more than anything else, but there are some things I'd like to ask your boyfriend first. Do you think he'll talk to me?"

Seifer maneuvered his vehicle into an empty parking space and turned the engine off completely, drenching the cabin into nearly complete darkness, before he finally chose to answer.

"He'll talk," he announced with more confidence than he could really call his own, "You just have to be patient."

Laguna nodded distractedly, before looking around. "... Hey, where are we?"

"Perkins Park," the blond high school senior stated evenly as he climbed out of his flame red pickup truck, watching how the other male finally did the same. "Squall comes here a lot. Knowing him and how he gets when he's upset, I don't think he went home, so I'm hoping that he came here."

Seifer scanned the rest of the parking lot, finding only a handful of other vehicles. One of them was a black, meticulously waxed Mercedes Benz with a car seat in the back, which Seifer figured could quite possibly belong to Squall's mother. He had hoped to find Squall at his usual hiding place, and from the appearance of things, his intuition had not failed him.

The sun had long disappeared beneath the horizon, and the air was holding a crisp chill. Shuddering slightly, Seifer retrieved his leather jacket from his back seat and quickly shrugged into it.

"Let's go," he ordered as he slammed the truck door shut and gazed at Laguna, who was standing a few feet away from him. Then, his eyes drifted towards one of the pebbled paths leading to the playground that him and Squall knew much too well.

"I wanna find him before he does anything stupid," Seifer muttered under his breath, while unconsciously rubbing the inside of his left wrist with his thumb.

"What do you mean by that?" the journalist from Esthar asked as he stepped up to Seifer and slowly followed him down that dark, winding trail lined with expertly trimmed bushes, ancient trees and iron wrought street lanterns that illuminated the way in a warm, hushed hue of gold. There was a faint drizzle of ice cold rain falling from the sky now, muting all sounds around them.

He couldn't even hear Seifer sigh.

"Nothing," the blond said evasively. "Just thinking out loud."

Laguna seemed content with that answer, because he didn't delve any further into the subject. Quietly, Seifer led him deeper into Perkins Park, his head constantly moving from side to side as he scanned his environment for a trace of his elusive classmate. They passed a young couple and a man with his dog on their way, but Squall was nowhere to be found.

Finally, they had reached the playground, which looked cold and ominous in the pitch black of the quickly proceeding night. Seifer could hear a set of swings creaking forebodingly in the distance as the wind moved them back and forth, but other than that, they found nothing but silence.

"Wait here," Seifer ordered as he bounded through the sand pit and to the jungle gym. He quickly ascended the ladder that led up to the hut where he had once found Squall, but when he stuck his head inside the opening, his heart sank with disappointment.

"... He's not here."

Seifer's face was tight when he dropped back down to the bottom and turned around. Laguna was still waiting by the edge of the playground, watching him very closely. To Seifer's surprise, he noted that the constant mist of rain around them had turned into fragile, gently falling snow flakes that danced to the ground without hurry.

'_It really does start to snow early around here. This is bad. It's starting to get really fuckin' cold.'_

"Are you sure he'd come out here when it's this late and freezing out?" the man asked with a shudder when Seifer pushed past him and proceeded further down the path. "It's dark, and it's starting to snow. You really believe he's out here?"

"I don't know," Seifer admitted grimly as he pressed on, watching as his own breath came as white fog from his lips, "But it's the only place I can think of."

As they continued to make their way through the park, trudging quietly side by side along the lake which was shimmering softly in the snowblind moonlight, Seifer finally figured it couldn't hurt to try and call Squall's cell phone. He didn't honestly believe that the brunette would answer, but they were running out of options, and it was at least worth a shot. Therefore, he retrieved his phone from his pocket, dialed the brunette's number and held the device to his ear to listen for the unnerving, mechanic ring tone.

What he heard, however, was something entirely different.

Somewhere off in the near distance, he thought he could make out the hushed, remote sound of a phone ringing. He immediately dropped his hand that was still holding the sleek mobile device and merely listened, tilting his head towards the direction of the wind blowing across the rippled surface of the lake.

"Over there," Laguna said, pointing towards one of the landing docks that extended into the murky water. Seifer followed the man's hand with his eyes, discovering a small, willowy figure in dark pants and a white shirt standing atop the wooden planks with their back turned towards them.

"Squall..." Seifer whispered, staring at the boy with a mixture of relief and uncertainty. Quickly, he closed his phone and slipped it back inside his pocket, only to advance towards that dark haired young man standing drenched in the cold light of the rising moon.

As Seifer stepped onto the dock, he could hear Laguna following closely behind him. The blond turned around, looking both resolute and unsure at the same time as he raised his hand in a halting gesture.

"Hold on," the blond murmured, watching how the older male hesitated in his stride and finally stopped entirely. "I need to talk to him first."

Standing by the edge of the lake, somewhere amongst a few trees and dried shoots of bamboo that were covered in a faint dusting of snow now, Laguna nodded in agreement and looked on as the tall, blond haired teenager carefully paced across the creaking planks of wood, towards that motionless brunette who still hadn't done anything to acknowledge their presence. Seifer recognized his classmate's clothing almost instantly; as he approached the lonesome figure, his eyes roved over tightly muscled legs covered by dark blue jeans, a head full of tousled oak brown hair and lean, subtly moving arms in white cotton long sleeves that had been pushed up to Squall's elbows.

_'It's him, it really-'_

Then suddenly, Seifer's breathing stilled.

Green eyes snapped wide when they locked onto the brunette boy's lower arms and hands. Squall was still wearing his characteristic leather wrist bands, but the knuckles of both of his hands were covered in a thick, dark sheen of blood, which was dripping to the ground in a slow, steady trickle.

The very moment that the initial shock had passed, Seifer let out a gasp.

"Squall!" he groaned, quickly approaching the brunette as the panic set in. "Squall, what the hell did you—"

Everything after that happened much too fast for the blond to comprehend. Squall turned, almost stoically, and Seifer saw the piercing flash of anger in his dark grey eyes only for a brief second, before the brunette's right fist suddenly collided with his face.

"_Ugh_!"

Seifer stunned back, feeling the harsh impact of the other boy's blow on his left cheek and eye, and his vision was dancing with bright white stars. For a moment, he was too dazed to think just one coherent thought. It was only out of impulse that he reached out and caught the second blow thrown at his face by wrapping his fingers tightly around Squall's right forearm.

"Squall," he grunted the brunette's name, feeling the other boy struggle. Through the haze in his mind and the metallic taste in his mouth, he managed to yank the younger male against him, and as he looked over Squall's shoulder, he saw Laguna quickly heading towards their position.

"No!" Seifer shouted, shaking his head and spitting out a mouthful of blood. "No, it's fine! I have it under control!"

Of course, it was everything but fine, and Squall was as far out of his control as he'd ever been, yet Seifer knew instinctively that Laguna's presence would only aggravate the situation further. Squall was thrashing in his hold, trying to swipe out at him with his left arm as if to antagonize him, but Seifer pinned them both against the brunette's back.

"Calm down," he ordered roughly, breathing the words against Squall's temple. He could feel the dark haired boy's heart pounding hard and fast even through the fabric of his shirt, and his breathing was a ragged, angry cadence against his chest.

"Let go of me!" the boy spat acidly, struggling to free himself. "What do you want? Did you come to fuck with me some more? Huh? Is fucking with my head really that much fun for you? You piece of shit! Get the hell off me! I fucking hate you!"

"Squall," Seifer whispered in a tight, hollow voice. The brunette's words stung; although Seifer understood Squall's anger to a certain degree, it didn't make it hurt any less.

"Don't _touch_ me, you dumb motherfucker!"

Finally, Squall managed to force his way out of Seifer's grasp. He immediately jumped two steps back, glaring at the blond out of eyes that were almost black with fury.

"Squall," Seifer repeated the boy's name, and his features twitched agonizingly. "Squall, look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you, I—"

"Fuck you!" the dark haired teen yelled, his voice interlaced with hurt as he looked prepared to lunge himself at Seifer once more.

"If you wanna hit me, go ahead," Seifer sighed, looking at the other male with resignation in his eyes. "I know I shouldn't have surprised you like that at the restaurant, but I never intended to cause you any harm. I had no idea it was going to turn out like that."

"Bullshit!" Squall hissed. "You were trying to get a fucking laugh out of it! Is this funny to you? Having some random bastard tell me he fucked my _Mom_? What the fuck is wrong with you, you asshole? What am I to you, just some fucking wind-up toy?"

"I _wasn't_ making fun of you," the blond tried to convince his opposite in a stunned tone of voice, shaking his head. "It was nothing like that, I swear. Why would you even think that? You really think I'd do something like that to you? You should know me better than that by now. You're not a toy, okay? You never were. Please, Squall... just let me explain."

"No, fuck you, I don't wanna hear what you have to say!"

"Squall—"

"I'm sick of you fucking with me! I'm sick of it, okay?" the brunette shrieked, his eyes wide and burning with a bizarre contempt that bordered to madness. For some reason, Seifer could tell that Squall's irrational response was about more than just him and Laguna. "Go find someone else to lie to, I've had enough of this shit!"

"... It wasn't a lie."

Squall jerked, turning around at the sound of a new voice that had unexpectedly erupted from somewhere behind him. He found that offending man from the restaurant, Laguna Loire, slowly walking towards them, his eyes fixed on him with mute concentration.

As his mood ascended new peaks of foulness, Squall whipped around towards Seifer once more.

"You brought him _with you_?" the brunette spat in angry disbelief, looking betrayed. "You fucking—"

"Hold on! Just hear me out, please," Seifer pleaded, taking a careful step towards the brunette. "If you still wanna hate me afterwards, that's fine. But _please_, listen to me first."

"No, I—"

"Squall," Laguna interrupted, raising both hands in a calming gesture. "I know you don't know me, and my word may mean nothing to you, but I promise you Seifer wasn't lying to you, and neither was I. Nobody was trying to make fun of you. What I told you was the truth. I _do_ know your mother - very well, in fact. We went to high school together. I dated her for many years."

"How would you know that? You don't even know me, you don't know my mother, you—"

"I saw a picture."

Squall's hateful words got caught somewhere in his throat, and his gaze flung towards Seifer, who merely made a weak grimace.

"A picture...?" Squall asked vacantly, not understanding.

"Yes. He showed me a picture of your mother, Raine, and there's no doubt she's the girl I used to date. No doubt whatsoever. I would _never_ mistake her for anyone else," Laguna explained willingly. "See... Seifer and I met purely by chance. We met at school today, when I was taking pictures of the architecture for my private collection. He said he wanted to introduce me to you, because he thought that you and I looked alike. That's it. Seifer had no idea that I knew your mother until you and I met at the restaurant tonight. It was a surprise for all of us."

Seifer noticed how the brunette swallowed, and as some of his anger dissipated to be replaced with confusion, Squall simply stared at the man for a long time.

"But..." the dark haired boy started, biting his lips.

"Squall, I know I joke around a lot, but I would _never_ fuck with you on something like this," Seifer tried to convince his younger opposite. "Never, okay? I understand what I did at Ward's was stupid and ignorant, but I never had any bad intentions. I swear, I just didn't know any better. You gotta believe me."

Squall's gaze slid from Laguna to Seifer, then back. His eyes narrowed skeptically as they looked the taller man up and down, before he finally growled with a defensive attitude, "Alright... Then who the _fuck_ are you?"

The man sighed softly and gave the boy a faint half-smile.

"I'm not sure there's an easy answer to that question."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Squall snapped. His mood was unusually aggressive.

"Well... It looks like I'm your mother's ex-boyfriend, for starters," Laguna explained tentatively. "I was born and raised in Balamb, like her, but I live in Esthar now. I've lived there for a few years. I'm a photographer and a journalist. I own the Esthar Times."

Seifer quickly raised an eyebrow at that bit of information. Loire had told him that he was a journalist for the prestigious newspaper of Esthar, the Esthar Times, which was the biggest and most popular in the nation – he _hadn't_ told him that he actually _owned_ the damn thing!

"So?" Squall bit tightly, eyes glittering challengingly as he jerked his shoulder in a shrug. "I don't know you. I don't know who you are. What the fuck do you want? Why are you here right now?"

Seifer watched him shivering and wiping his sleeve across his mouth in a manner of frustration. Again, it brought the brunette's blood-streaked hands to his attention, and the eighteen year old cringed.

"Squall," the blond said, carefully taking a step towards his friend. "What the hell happened to your hands?"

"Nothing," Squall growled, whipping his head aside. Immediately, he proceeded to tuck his hands under his armpits.

"Did you...?" Seifer started, a nervous edge to his voice, but he didn't finish that question, knowing he did not need to.

Indeed, Squall turned his head to glare at him, hissing spitefully, "No, I _didn't_. Fuck you, okay!"

Laguna, who was slightly confused by the boys' cryptic conversation, monitored how Seifer sighed, brushed a few errant snowflakes from his temple and suddenly closed the space that separated him and Squall. The brunette boy, who had been standing with his back towards the edge of the water, leaving his escape route entirely cut off, flinched as Seifer wrapped one arm around him and pulled him close. Laguna could hear Seifer mumbling something, but he couldn't understand what it was. The brunette boy, Squall, who didn't seem fond of physical contact at all as far as the photographer could tell, made an effort at thrusting Seifer away. He stopped, however, when the blond abruptly clasped his right arm and yanked it up to the dark haired teen's eyes, as if trying to prove some kind of point. Past Seifer's shoulder and the brunette's blood riddled hand, Laguna could study Squall's face, which looked strikingly handsome but paler than he would consider normal. The boy was staring at Seifer out of narrowed smoke grey eyes, his chin held up in stubborn pride, and for the first time, it really, _truly _struck Laguna how much that temperamental kid looked like Raine.

Squall had her eyes, her carefully considered facial expressions, that same fearless attitude and those same innately graceful movements that demanded attention. Many years ago, he had pictured himself starting a family with this boy's mother, and he had never once considered that he may have _had _a family with her all along.

'_My god. What if that is my __**son**__?'_

Panic hit Laguna's chest like a freight train, and he let out a startled breath. He shook his head, trying with all his might to remain focused, because he knew that this was more important than anything in his life had ever been. His feelings for Raine had been blunted over nearly two decades, but never forgotten, and this young man's face stirred up a slur of old dreams and nightmares that seemed determined to take control of Laguna's ability to form any rational kind of thought.

"Squall," the man called the boy's name, raising his voice now. He, too, stepped closer to the edge of the wooden wharf, hearing his every step creaking on the slick planks. He felt as if he was crossing years of uncertainty, reaching for the truth that was suddenly standing right in front of him in the form of a boy who was so impossibly young, abrasive and cold, staring back at Laguna out of eyes shadowed with deeply seated mistrust.

Meanwhile, Seifer took a cautious half-step aside and released Squall's arm, almost as if to give the other two males some space. He gazed upon his younger friend with concern, noting how fragile and yet confrontational the brunette looked at the same time. Squall's hands were bleeding, not because he had cut them, but because he had attempted to slam a hole into a nearby oak tree in his anger, or at least so the brunette had claimed. All the same, Seifer had to acknowledge that the dark haired youth was as self-destructive as he always had been. Whether he hurt himself with a razor blade or without actually made very little difference.

The more that realization settled in with Seifer, the more he wanted to panic and hit the brunette for being so goddamn oblivious.

Just how many lives did that stupid boy think he had? And did he care about any of them at all?

"What do you want?" the brunette finally asked, directing the spiteful question towards Laguna and not Seifer. There was a quick flare of hostility in his eyes; an expression that the blond had seen on the damaged teenager one too many times.

"I need to talk to you," Laguna stated simply, halting just a few steps away from the two boys.

There was an urgency in his inflection that caused Squall to bite back any insult possibly lingering on his tongue, and instead snarl, "About what?"

"About you. About your mother. About your _father_."

Squall let out a sharp hiss, and Seifer could hear him making a repulsed growling noise, low in his throat.

"I don't _have_ a father," the brunette snapped icily, his inflection almost cruel. Years of feeling unwanted and being abused and betrayed had left him with no healthy concept of a father figure whatsoever. It wasn't something he wanted to discuss, much less have in his life anymore.

At this point, he couldn't possibly have cared less.

"Everyone has a father, Squall," the man lectured him, and it wasn't the first time Squall had heard this. The words might have sounded much kinder than any time before, but they still caused him to chuckle sardonically.

"Yeah, right, whatever you say," he snorted, pouring on the sarcasm.

"When were you born?" Laguna asked, remaining persistent and attempting to breach the subject from a different angle. Semi-consciously, he noted how Seifer had stepped further off to the side and was taking off his coat, although he never allowed the brunette to come outside his reach. His watchful behavior was quite intriguing to Laguna, although he wasn't able to fully focus on the dynamics of Seifer's and Squall's relationship at this time.

"August 23rd," Squall replied stiffly, immediately following the answer with an aggressive, "Why, what do you care?"

Laguna, who suddenly looked thoughtful and seemed to be performing some kind of equation inside his head, apparently felt the need to inquire further. "Were you born premature, by chance?"

"I was born a month early," the brunette elaborated with reluctance, now folding his arms around his torso. He hardly even noticed that he was shivering. "What is it to you? What's with all these weird fucking questions?"

"Has your mother ever mentioned anything to you about who your father is?" Laguna asked, feeling a knot forming in his throat. "Anything at all?"

"If she did, it'd be none of _your_ business," the brunette said cuttingly. "I don't even know who the fuck you are, other than some old boyfriend of hers from long ago. And for all I know, that might be a lie, too."

"You don't understand," Laguna sighed, and his deep well of patience caused his voice to remain gentle despite Squall's uncalled-for hostility. This was the most difficult conversation he had ever had with another human being, and he wasn't so sure he was doing it right.

Nonetheless, he was intensely aware that this might be his one-time chance to find out just what exactly had gone wrong nearly 18 years ago.

"Squall, if you were really born on August 23rd, seventeen years ago, then you need to know that your mother and I dated and slept with each other until about 8 months before your birth."

The brunette stood in silence, feeling the snow moving around him in a cold, merciless flurry of air currents, waiting for the man's statement to sink in.

It wouldn't.

"... _What_?" he asked in a breathless voice, his eyes widening slightly. Laguna was returning his gaze, looking almost resigned. Understanding this situation wasn't any easier for him than it was for Squall. Next to them, lingering a little bit off to the side as if trying not to intrude, was Seifer, holding his leather jacket in his hands, wondering what was going to happen next.

Judging by the resentful, tortured expression on Squall's face, it could be nothing good.

"What the _hell_ are you saying?" the brunette asked, his voice resonating with barely restrained rage. Something in his mind seemed to have dislodged, and Laguna finally understood that this boy had been hurt in a past that was far from forgotten.

"I don't know what I'm saying, or maybe I do, I'm not sure," Laguna admitted with honesty, raising his hands weakly. "All I know is that even though your mother left town and me without an explanation, she would have never, ever cheated on me while we were together. She never mentioned anything to me about being pregnant, but if you were born in August, then she had to have gotten pregnant in December, if not sooner. And... that December was the very last time I saw your mother and made love to her. That is all I know for certain at this point. I... Squall, trust me... this whole thing confuses me as much as it confuses you."

The look on Squall's face, however, wasn't one of confusion. His cheeks had flushed red, and his features were pulled into a startling grimace full of deeply rooted, long nurtured hatred that had been breeding within his wounded heart for nearly two decades.

"You... you are..." Squall hissed ominously, the words so hard and hollow that they were barely audible. Seifer could see a kind of raw, consuming pain in his eyes that he had never seen on another human being before.

He realized that all hell was about to break loose.

"_You're_ the guy who put her through all this! You're the coward who fucked her and _left_ her! You're the bastard who wasn't there for her when she needed you the most, when everybody was just fucking abandoning her, when she was _seventeen_ and _pregnant_ and all on her _fucking_ own! It was YOU! It's all **_YOUR_**_ fucking fault_!"

Suddenly, Squall hurled himself at the man without warning, determined to cause Laguna Loire as much pain as he and his mother had been put through all these years. His emotionally charged attack, however, was abruptly cut short by Seifer, who had flung himself forward and grabbed him from behind, pulling Squall back with astounding strength.

"**No**!" the blond shouted, immediately tightening his hold on the irate brunette. He knew nothing of the extent of abuse that Squall had suffered in the past, yet he understood the younger male's blinding rage. Squall had been abandoned before he'd even been born - he had a _right _to be angry. All the same, Seifer had recognized the dark, violent flame in the brunette's eyes for precisely what it was – bloodlust that was so powerful and brutal and ran so deep that Squall would have probably killed the man if he had only been given half a chance.

"Let me _go_!" Squall spat, fighting with all that he had against Seifer's protective embrace, while never taking his eyes off Laguna. "Let me go, I'll fucking kill him, I'll _kill_ that motherfucker, I'll—"

"No, Squall," Seifer whispered hoarsely against desperate tears that had lodged in the back of his throat. He was holding the brunette impossibly tight, not even acknowledging the boy kicking and punching him as he flailed his arms and legs. "I know it hurts, _I know_, believe me, but it won't change a damn thing, you—"

"Fuck you! _Fuck you_ and let me the fuck go!" the brunette screamed in a mad, hysterical rage. "I fucking hate you! Get your fucking hands off me, Almasy! Let me go!"

"I can't," the blond shook his head, ignoring the tearing ache in his chest.

"You have no _right_ to keep me from doing it, you—"

"You killing him isn't going to accomplish _anything_," Seifer announced wisely, even though he knew it wasn't what Squall wanted to hear. Even through his destructive, violent anger, there were tears running down the brunette's face, and it broke Seifer's heart to know that he could do nothing to make this process easier on his friend.

He had never meant for it to go this far, this fast.

Laguna still stood a few feet away from them, watching Squall's meltdown in a stunned, powerless stupor. The last time he had felt so lost had been when he had received Raine's letter all those long years ago, urging him to follow his dreams, even without her in his life... that her presence would only weigh down his future, when really, it had been all that had ever mattered to him.

'_The letter...'_

He looked up, finding that the boy was still going ballistic, spitting rude, wounding curses at him and his boyfriend as he thrashed around in Seifer's arms, and he wondered whether Squall had ever been given the full extent of his and Raine's story.

Whether he knew how deeply he had loved her then.

... How much he _still_ loved her now.

_'He has to know. He has to. There is no other way.'_

"Squall," he spoke the boy's name with a strange gravity as he carefully moved towards the brunette, which caused both young men to jerk in surprise. For a moment, Squall's body became incredibly still, and he looked upon the approaching man in alarm. "Squall... I know you hate me, and I wouldn't dream of blaming you for it, but listen to me. You _have_ to listen. I don't know what you think happened in the past, and I don't know what Raine told you, but I would have never left your mother. Ever."

"Bullshit!" the brunette shrieked, throwing himself against Seifer's arms once more. "Bullshit! You lying piece of _shit_! My mother meant nothing to you, you selfish _fuck_! I'll kick your _fucking_ face in, you fucking cock bag, you dirty-"

"Squall, I didn't leave your mother the first time she thought she was pregnant, and I would have _never_ left her when she actually _was_, if only I had ever known."

The jumbled gush of curse words jarred somewhere between Squall's throat and lips, and the brunette held in a shocked, aborted breath. Laguna's expression was soft when he looked at him, and his eyes were filled with a certain affection and patience that the brunette had never once seen on Kato's face.

"W-what?" Squall asked in a rasp voice, trying to understand Laguna's words.

Obviously, this was news to him, and he had no idea how to react.

"When your mother was sixteen, she thought she was pregnant with my child," the man explained tranquilly, his eyes fogging over at the memory. "I told her then that I would always be there for her and the baby, that I would marry her on the spot and drop out of school if necessary so I could support her. It was never even a question in my eyes, not even for one split second. It... well... it later turned out that she wasn't pregnant after all, but it didn't change a thing. I loved her more than I could ever explain to you, Squall. She could have been brain dead or lost all of her limbs, and I would have loved her anyway. Your mother was one of those people that you only come across once in your lifetime. She was the one I never wanted to be without. When she left, she took away half of my whole existence."

"You're lying," Squall snarled, trying to be unmoved by the emotion he saw in Laguna's eyes when the man spoke of his mother. "Why should I believe a fucking word you say?"

"Because I have no reason to lie to you, Squall," the man replied simply. "Trust me, I knew nothing of her pregnancy, much less of you. When your mother left me after Christmas, eighteen years ago, she gave me no reason and no explanation. I was at a complete loss, and perhaps I was an idiot for not considering that she might be carrying a child. That was my fault, and I am fully aware of that. But if she was pregnant then, and if she wanted to leave Balamb, then she definitely didn't want me to know about it. She never said a word."

"My mother left Balamb _because_ she was pregnant with me!" Squall hissed, but there was a hint of agony to his voice that was entirely new. "She never had a choice! Her parents wanted her to have a fucking abortion! Why would she tell _them_ and not you, if you supposedly loved her so goddamn much?"

Seifer, who was still holding Squall captive (albeit at a much lesser effort), watched how Laguna brought one hand to his mouth, looking both thunderstruck and enlightened at the same time as his eyes became unfocused.

"So that's why... God, I should've known..." the man murmured, shaking his head as he remained alone with his thoughts for a moment, before turning his gaze towards Squall once more. "Squall, listen... When your mother broke up with me, I went back to Balamb and talked to your grandparents. They seemed highly upset over something, and they physically kicked me out of their house. They never told me what they were so angry about. It finally makes sense now. They knew what had happened, and they hated me for it. I'm sure they figured that I had just ruined every ambitious dream they had ever had for Raine, and trust me, they had many. In the end, they hated me enough that they would've rather seen her get an abortion than have me care for the child. Unfortunately... it does seem like them to ask something like that from their daughter. My god, I wish she would have just told me. I wish she would have given me a chance to _fix _this..."

"It was _your_ fault," Squall growled darkly. "Don't try to blame it on my mother or her parents! So what if she didn't tell you? It was _still_ your fault! If she had been able to trust you, if she had been able to fucking _depend_ on you, she wouldn't have had to deal with this all on her own!"

Laguna looked at him sadly, and when he spoke, his voice was interlaced with genuine guilt and disappointment. "I'm afraid you may be right about that. Apparently, she didn't trust me at all."

"You have no _idea_ what the fuck she went through," the boy continued to snarl in a strangled voice full of resentment. "She worked in bars and danced in strip clubs for years, only so she could make enough money and still spend time with me! She should have been in college, without a fucking care in the world, and instead she had to fucking deal with me and figuring out how she could buy me diapers and food and put a roof over my fucking head!"

Seifer raised his eyebrows, reminded by Squall's words of the conversation they had once had at his apartment, when the brunette had claimed he wished he'd never been born. For a moment, he wondered whether Squall was truly angry at Laguna, or whether this was just bitterness towards his own presence in this world that he had harbored for years, allowing it to grow in his wounded heart like a disease.

"It's your fault," the brunette repeated, grinding his teeth as his whole world came down upon him, and all he wanted was someone to blame. "All of this is _your_ fault."

"... You're right," the photographer from Esthar admitted with a calm, almost peaceful sigh, and it caused both teenagers to give him blank stares. It wasn't the kind of response that either one of them had expected, much less the fact that the man suddenly stepped within Squall's reach, looking down upon the dark haired teen with a gentleness he had always reserved for his loved ones. "But if your existence really _is_ my fault, Squall, then I'm not sorry one bit."

Seifer let out a stunned breath, and he could feel that Squall was doing the same. The brunette boy had suddenly become very quiet in his arms, although Seifer still noticed him jerking every now and then. Laguna's words, which had sounded much too sincere to be a lie or some kind of cheesy line, had finally caught Squall off guard. Squall's whole belief system and his entire storyboard of what kind of man his 'sperm donor' truly was suddenly collapsed like a scaffold and left him with nothing but a burning ache in his stomach and a mind full of unanswered questions.

Who was this man named Laguna Loire? Why was he here? What were his intentions? Did he _really_ love his mother as much as he claimed?

... What if he _did_?

And just why could Squall no longer feel hateful towards the man? Because Laguna seemed to be just as kind and simple as Squall had always imagined his father to be, back when he had still been a child, unconsumed by mistrust and bitterness? Because his mother hadn't once spoken badly of him, despite all of her struggles? Or maybe because - for once in his life - someone other than Squall's own mother had finally declared his existence as something worthwhile, instead of something regrettable?

In the end, Squall had never felt so much at a loss.

The snow was still falling all around them, and a few errant, crystalline flakes were covering Squall's dark hair and the nape of his neck. As the brunette's fury ebbed away, so did his last residual bits of body heat. Squall began to shiver more noticeably now, and Seifer finally remembered his coat, which he had taken off a while ago to offer to his lean framed classmate. As he looked around, he found it somewhere by his feet, and for a moment, he contemplated whether it would be safe for him to let go of Squall in order to retrieve it.

"Put that jacket back on," he suddenly heard Laguna's voice, and there was an obvious paternal streak to it. "And you... put on this."

Surprised, Seifer looked up to find the man shrugging out of his own, expensive looking woolen coat, leaving him to wear nothing but a thin, long sleeved cotton shirt. With a faint smile, Laguna stepped halfway around Squall, and he waited several moments for Seifer to very hesitantly back away from his classmate's figure. This, of course, gave the brunette ample opportunity to lunge himself at the photographer once more if he really wished to do so, but to the blond's surprise, Squall did nothing of that sort. He simply stood there, hardly even breathing while his head was inclined, allowing Laguna to drape his heavy coat across his shoulders.

The man studied Squall's profile carefully, noting the pallor of his skin and the nearly feverish glow in his steel blue eyes. Squall was taking a few sniffling breaths through his nose, and his expression remained desolate and detached as he stared at some random spot in the darkness.

They could only guess the thoughts barreling through his mind.

"We need to get him out of this cold," Laguna remarked to Seifer, yet jabbing his chin in Squall's direction. Seifer moved his head in a silent affirmative, before bending down to pick up his own jacket.

"You sure you don't want this?" Seifer asked, while offering his coat to the man in a gesture of chivalry. Laguna, however, only smiled.

"No," the photographer said. "Thanks, but I'll be fine. I'm more worried about the two of you."

Seifer nodded semiconsciously, and he swiped his classmate a concerned glance as he put his coat back on. Squall still hadn't moved, and the blond realized that his friend was in no mental or physical condition to be driving right now.

"I'll take him home with me," the blond stated, almost expecting the brunette to pipe up and refuse. "We can pick up his car tomorrow."

"Yeah, that's probably a good idea," the man agreed. "I think I'm going to call Kiros and have him pick me up."

"I can give you a ride," Seifer offered, trying to be helpful. He wanted to feel resentment towards the dark haired man – the man who had turned out to very likely be Squall's father – but for some reason, the hatred he longed for just wasn't there. In the end, Laguna Loire didn't strike him as the cunning, careless type of man that would leave his pregnant girlfriend to fend for herself. Perhaps Squall had always had a skewed image of his father, and Seifer couldn't possibly blame him. Nevertheless, he hoped that the two males would be able to meet with Raine and figure out the entire secret that was their past, as well as the ties that connected them.

"No, that's alright," Laguna refused, albeit in a friendly manner. "I think Squall needs some space right now. This is a lot to deal with."

"What about Raine?" Seifer asked. "Don't you wanna talk to her?"

He noticed the sudden glint in the other male's eyes – the longing for the woman he had been missing for so long. Laguna seemed hesitant now, but obviously, he was trying to choose reason over emotion.

"It's getting late, and we probably shouldn't—"

"No."

Laguna broke off, interrupted by the coarse monotone that was Squall's voice. The brunette wasn't looking at him, but he had raised his head slightly to gaze towards the lights that were shining like beacons in the park. His eyes were narrowed, and when Seifer stepped closer to him, he saw that they looked glassy and blood shot.

"Squall..."

"I... need to talk to my mother... I need to hear... what she has to say," the thin brunette pressed, the words melting into the cold night air as his head bowed once more, making him look so helpless and broken. "I can't... I... I _need_ to know. I can't do this anymore..."

"I understand..." Seifer agreed hesitantly. "Listen... Do you... wanna have her come over to my place? I'm assuming bringing _him_ over to your stepdad's house wouldn't be the smartest idea."

Squall continued to stare into the darkness, but eventually, he forced out a nod. He had always tried _not_ to deliberate too much on the topic of his father; it had been much easier to think of the man as dead. Now, he wasn't so sure anymore. Would it really be wiser to let his father's image rest in peace, and pretend that his life and his _mother's_ life were just fine this way, with Kato constantly looming in the shadows, threating Raine's and Ellone's well-being? Granted, Laguna's sudden presence in the picture changed nothing about his guilt and the fact that his mother had been abandoned during pregnancy, but perhaps things weren't as simple as Squall had once thought. In the end, he knew that if he didn't ask his mother to tell him the whole story of his birth, he'd never find peace again.

"Squall. Are you sure you're okay with me coming along?" Laguna asked considerately, although his inflection was hopeful.

"... It makes no difference," the brunette murmured coldly, sounding drained of all his strength. He no longer even seemed to have the power left in him to argue. It made Seifer nervous to see his classmate in this resigned kind of stupor, but he figured than anyone would feel emotionally exhausted after dealing with the chaos that Squall had faced tonight.

Still, he wished that there was something he could do.

With a sigh, he curled his right arm around Squall's shoulder, feeling the brunette tense beneath his touch.

"C'mon," he said, gently ushering the boy towards dry land, which was covered in spotty flecks of coldest white. "Let's go. I know how much you hate snow, anyway."

Laguna wondered at those words, and he watched with awe how Seifer led the brunette towards the park, away from the water, with a tenderness that seemed uncharacteristic for someone the boy's age and size. Really, that Seifer was an entirely unusual kid. When everything was said and done, Laguna had to admit that he owed it to Seifer's courage and persistence alone that he had been able to meet Raine's son – the absurdly handsome and yet callous teenage boy who could quite possibly be his very own flesh and blood.

"Ouch!"

As his thoughts gravitated towards Raine and Squall, Laguna could feel a searingly painful twitch in his left leg. It was a muscle cramp, which was very familiar to him, although he hadn't felt one like it in quite some time. Back in his younger days, he had gotten cramps in his legs quite frequently, mostly when he had been nervous due to one reason or another.

Honestly, he thought he had outgrown that quirk a long time ago.

_'Maybe some things never change.'_

And so they made their long way through the darkness to Seifer's truck, two of them huddled together in search of warmth and comfort, one of them hobbling along on only one fully functional leg, none of them realizing that their lives, from here on, would never be the same again.

* * *

I hope you enjoyed this chapter, because it will probably the last one I can release this year. I'm sure this chapter was confusing and it doesn't all make sense yet, but give me some time and hopefully I can get you there. Personally, I enjoy Laguna's and Raine's characters, because even though so little is said about them in the game, you can still tell a lot about their personalities. Raine seemed a little distant at times, but she seems so strong and independent at the same time - like a mother who would truly do anything to defend her children. Laguna always struck me as the guy who couldn't find his way out of a paper bag, but who has plenty of courage and loyalty towards the people he cares for. He's different from Squall, but very similar at the same time. I also re-watched the ending scenes between Laguna and Raine, and it's just the sweetest thing to watch them getting engaged (married?). There really is so much love there, I think.


	31. Ghosts of the Past

-:-  
**Chapter 31  
****Ghosts of the Past**

"_This is your story, and you have a right to know where it began."_

-:-

He was swimming in a sea of iridescent city lights and sparkling snow flakes that hastily flickered by the windows of Seifer's truck, yet his consciousness barely even registered their fleeting presence. His young mind was curtained with dark and heavy thoughts as he sat there buckled into the passenger seat, listening to the steady howl of the engine as they hurried across the freeway. His face was a frown as he absently fidgeted with the smooth metal casing of his cell phone, which he was cradling in his lap. He kept turning the small device over and over in his fingers, waiting for some miraculous rush of determination that simply wouldn't come to him.

He wasn't sure this was a phone call he'd be able to make.

"Squall."

Subconsciously, he raised his chin, realizing that his companion, Seifer, had just called his name. Squall's messy brown hair was damp from the fallen snow, and it clung to his skin as he leaned back against the head rest. He shifted aside in discomfort to throw a half-lidded gaze over at his brawny friend and driver, who was studying him with an expression mostly dominated by concern.

"You don't have to do this."

Seifer was fixing him with that determined, green eyed stare of his, willing him to believe that he honestly had a choice in this matter. As the brunette chanced a quick glance into one of the rear view mirrors, noting a set of headlights steadily trailing behind them, Squall closed his eyes and let out a sigh.

"... It's too late for that."

Seifer realized that his brunette friend wasn't simply referring to the fact that Laguna Loire was currently following them to his apartment in Raine's car. Back at Perkins Park, they had decided to travel in separate vehicles, and to Seifer's surprise, Squall had never once objected to his suggestion of letting Laguna drive the Mercedes. Then again, the blond figured that if Squall had an emotional attachment to _anything _at all, it certainly _wasn't _Raine's luxury sedan.

"I can still turn around," the eighteen year old offered redundantly, knowing full well that Squall would refuse. Perhaps it was better this way; the path ahead of Squall wasn't an easy one by any means, but if he'd run away now, he'd probably make the biggest mistake of his life. He had to confront his mother about his past and find out what had really happened eighteen years ago, no matter how difficult it would be for either one of them... no matter how much it might hurt.

Of course, Squall knew that, too.

Without acknowledging Seifer's offer, the brunette straightened up in his seat, and there was a sudden determination to his movements that had clearly been missing before. Stone-faced, Squall hit a series of buttons on his cell phone, before he tilted the receiver to his right ear and let his gaze wander out of the window once more. With unfocused slate blue eyes, he watched as the crystallized snowflakes that were drifting by clung almost desperately to the fogged up glass. As he sat there, he didn't realize that Seifer kept watching him from the side intermittently, regarding every single one of his movements and facial expressions with careful consideration.

Honestly, the blond looked like someone who was waiting for a bomb to go off.

"_Hello?"_

Seifer could hear the female voice that suddenly picked up Squall's call almost as loud as if the brunette boy had placed her on speaker phone. As the eighteen year old swiped another glance at his dark haired classmate, he could see that the brunette's jaw had tightened and his posture was more tense than before. Squall's brows were knitted together as he drew in a breath through the tightness in his throat, and Seifer could only imagine how tormenting of a situation this had to be for his friend. Despite all his usual senseless bravado, Squall was still little more than a child at seventeen years old, yet he had been forced to make adult decisions that nobody his age should have to be faced with.

To Seifer, none of this seemed fair.

"Mom," the brunette eventually replied in a gritty tone of voice that seemed to lack its ordinarily challenging edge. "It's me."

"_Oh, hi sweetheart. What's up? Are you on your way home?"_

"No..." Squall replied after a moment's worth of hesitation, and he shuffled around in his seat, looking uneasy. "Listen, I..."

"_Yes?"_

Seifer saw the indecisiveness in Squall's gaze, and the war that was waging inside of him reflected on his face with perfect clarity. What was going to happen now? What was Squall going to say? What was he _not_ going to say? Nothing was certain anymore at this point. What had Squall decided to do? Did he want to find out the truth about his own heritage and the love that his mother had lost, or had he chosen to remain blissfully ignorant, despite all the things that had been revealed to him tonight?

'_What are you going to do now, when you know that there's no way back to your life the way it was only days and hours ago? Are you going to make a run for it, like you've been doing all these years? Or...'_

When the blond finally noticed the hard, yet broken gleam of resolution in Squall's dark blue eyes, illuminated by the bright headlights of passing cars, he realized at once that his classmate had just made a decision far more profound than he had ever been forced to make in his entire life.

"Mom, I... I need you to come to Seifer's apartment."

"_What? To Seifer's apartment? But... You mean right now?"_

"No, no... not right now. In about half an hour or so," the brunette replied stiffly. "Please. It's important."

"_Squall, what's the matter? You sound odd. Is something wrong?"_

"I can't talk about it on the phone... I just need you to come to Seifer's place. And please don't bring Ell, or Kato."

"_What? Honey, this isn't like you. Seriously, you're starting to worry me! What's going on? Is everything alright? Talk to me, please."_

Squall shook his head, and he was rubbing his face with his left hand as his feelings spiraled out of the realm of his control. Seifer could tell how frustrated and confused the brunette was, and he wondered if his mother could sense it, too. In all reality, of course, Raine probably had no idea how much both of their lives would be changed tonight, just through this simple phone call alone.

"_Squall?"_

"Mom, can you please just come?" Squall asked, his tone exasperate as he blew out a sharp breath. "Please?"

"_Squall, you... but... ah..." _The blond could hear her pausing, deliberating Squall's words and possible motives in her mind, before she finally made a sound of resignation._ "Oh, of course I'll come. Don't worry, okay? I'll be on my way shortly. I remember the apartment complex, but which building does he live in, anyway?"_

"It's building 605... Apartment 225, I think."

"_Alright, I got it. Squall... seriously, tell me, is everything okay? Are you alright? Is Seifer alright?"_

"... Yeah, I'm fine, Mom. Everyone's fine. Don't worry."

"_Are you sure?"_

"I told you... We're fine."

"_Okay... I just wanna make sure everything's alright. I'll see you in a few minutes then, sweetheart."_

"Alright. Thanks."

Relieved over the fact that his mother hadn't continued to question his intentions, Squall quietly hung up the phone. With a distant expression, he slipped the mobile device back into his jeans, and he instinctively drew his black, expensive looking wool coat more tightly around himself in a desperate need for comfort.

'_No, not __**my**__ coat... __**his**__ coat.'_

He frowned at the memory of the man who had wrapped him in that jacket in an act of kindness – the same man who was following them to Seifer's apartment right now, ready to alter the course of his future perhaps forever.

Even now, Squall didn't know what to think of that journalist from Esthar, Laguna Loire, who claimed to be his mother's ex-boyfriend from high school. The man's story made sufficient sense for the time being, and for all it was worth, his lingering emotions for Raine seemed at least sincere. Nevertheless, the more Squall thought about the man, the more he wanted to vomit. Through all these years, he had never imagined himself to run into a man who would claim that he had once dated his mother, much less someone who would make the implication that he could possibly be his father.

None of this had ever been part of his plan.

'_What is the point of all of this, anyway? I don't want a father.__ I certainly don't need one.__ I'm seventeen years old, and I've been perfectly fine without one so far. What the hell am I even trying to accomplish here?'_

With a small groan, he dumped his forehead in the open palm of his right hand. Overwhelmed by the gravity of the situation, he could feel himself starting to lose control over his own life, and that loss of control scared him more than anything else. He felt as if someone had knocked the ground out from beneath his feet. His whole existence had become a question mark. Was he really the product of some loveless relationship as he had originally assumed, or perhaps that of an unlucky one-night stand, or was there more to the story than he'd believed in the past? Who was his father? Was he really the heartless, cruel bastard that Squall had always taken him for? Or had he been wrong about the man all along? Nothing made sense anymore. Squall felt an insecurity and a deeply seated, primitive fright that he wasn't sure he could handle. He didn't even quite know what exactly he was afraid of, but all the same, the feeling was there, gnawing on his insides like a disease.

Right now, there was nothing he wanted to do more than to pretend that he had never met this man named Laguna Loire. He wanted to close his eyes to the past and go on with his life, no matter how twisted it really was beneath the surface, but even someone as stubborn as Squall had to admit that it was, indeed, far too late for that.

"Squall."

He glanced over at his blond friend with a tired gaze, snapping a rude "_What_?" in a knee-jerk reaction, knowing full well that he was being unfair. This wasn't Seifer's fault, even if he _had_ arranged the meeting between Squall and his mother's ex-boyfriend. It would have been so easy to blame this complex family matter on the nosy blond, but when everything was said and done, Squall had never been that naïve. He knew that his past had been a tragedy long before Seifer had come along, and he had always known that he would have to face his demons some day, whether he was prepared for them or not.

He just hadn't figured that he would have to confront them so soon.

Seifer was looking back at him with that stoic, unimpressed face of his, ignoring Squall's rudeness entirely as he murmured, "... I'm sorry, Squall."

The blond's genuine kindness threw Squall off, although he should have probably been accustomed to it by now. For a moment, there was a crack in the deliberate, self-preserving carelessness written on the brunette's handsome face, and Seifer noticed an unusual flash of vulnerability in his friend's eyes. Squall's lips were twitching as he swallowed and turned his head away from him evasively.

"... It's not your fault."

Seifer could tell that his classmate was withdrawing himself, retreating to some safe spot in his mind where he could be alone with his thoughts, however scary they might be. The blond, however, wasn't going to just sit back and allow this to happen. It had cost him far too much effort to get Squall into this position of remote trust and openness; he wasn't about to just let the brunette exile himself in his own little world of misery and guilt.

"It's not _your_ fault, either," Seifer responded evenly.

Squall let out a curt, sardonic laugh, and as he grimaced at the blond, he asked dryly, "Oh? Then whose fault is it, exactly?"

Seifer's answer came without even a hint of uncertainty.

"Nobody's."

The brunette had no appropriate response to that, and he pressed his lips together tightly as he glared at Seifer with a frozen expression.

"This was never your fault, and you need to stop blaming yourself for it," the blond continued. "If your mother really loved that guy, and if he's really your father, then I'm sure she had her reasons for not telling him about you. Whatever they were, you had nothing to do with it. Your mother left for reasons that were entirely her own."

"Obviously she couldn't depend upon him," Squall said, sounding bitter as he struggled to find an explanation for his mother's confusing behavior. "I'm sure that's why she didn't tell him."

"Maybe she didn't _want_ to depend upon him," Seifer countered wisely. "Have you ever thought about that?"

"That makes no fucking sense. Why would anyone rather work as a stripper to support their child than to live happily ever after with the guy who knocked them up?" the younger boy snapped scathingly. "Especially if they supposedly loved each other so goddamn much."

"Well, if you really wanna go on about sense, then explain to me why anyone would rather cut their own wrists and bleed away their problems than to just _talk_ about them and figure out how to fuckin' fix them?" Seifer retorted, and he saw how the brunette's face fell. "Squall, all I'm saying is that life doesn't always makes sense. I think you should hear your mother out, and maybe even give the guy a chance. And if nothing else, at least you'll know the goddamn truth."

Squall held in a breath, his gaze drifting across Seifer's good-looking face almost as if he was searching for something that wasn't there.

"Maybe I don't _wanna_ know the truth," he finally murmured in a hollow voice, before his features grew hard and his eyes became distant.

"Then that's your decision," Seifer said patiently, jerking one shoulder in a complacent shrug. "But I think you're kidding yourself if you go on pretending that none of this happened tonight."

The brunette looked at his own lap in silence, knowing perfectly well that Seifer was right. Even so, it didn't mean that the reality of it didn't hurt. Every thought of his mother and the family he had always wanted, but never had, stung in his chest. He felt both guilty and betrayed at the same time; it was a dangerous mix of sentiments that caused his self-destructive tendencies to flare.

For so long, he had told himself that he didn't want a father in his life – that he _shouldn't _want one, just because his mother had always made a conscious effort to be enough of a parent to make up for his lack of a father figure. Deep down, in some dark, twisted corner of his mind, he honestly thought that he should feel bad for wanting someone to call "Dad" in his life. That the idea was selfish and ungrateful towards his mother, who had tried so very hard. Yet, at the same time, he still remembered those days of his early childhood when he had felt bitter and lonely and _sad_, longing to be loved and wanted by a man he had never even met. At some point, he had simply accepted the fact that he would never meet his father, and that it was pointless to seek the affection and approval of someone who wanted absolutely nothing to do with him. In that heartbreaking moment of resignation, something inside of Squall had simply shut down, and he wasn't sure that he was willing to reawaken that part of him now.

After all, it would probably bring him nothing but misery, and he already had enough of that in his life.

"Squall. We're here."

Squall's gaze flung out the window, and he looked startled when he realized that they had just pulled into Seifer's apartment complex. As he shot a cautious glimpse into the rear view mirror, he noticed that Laguna was still following closely behind them. There was another jolt that cut through Squall's chest when he thought of the man, but despite the chaos raging in his heart, he forced himself to stay calm.

'_... This is ridiculous. What am I getting all nervous about? I can do this. I'm not going to run away. I've been through so much worse. This is nothing. I don't care what happens tonight. I'm not scared. I'm not scared of anything.'_

With a grim expression, he unbuckled his seatbelt and climbed out of Seifer's truck as soon as the blond had safely parked the massive vehicle. He could see Laguna backing the black Mercedes into a nearby visitor parking spot, before the dark haired man himself proceeded to follow the boys' example and got out of the car. The instant that Squall's eyes fell upon the tall, brunette man, he could feel a weight pressing on his chest, making it hard for him to breathe. For a brief, but intense moment, he felt the overwhelming desire to hurl himself at Laguna once more. He wanted to make him pay for all those countless, pitiful nights he had spent crying in his bed as a child, when he had known that his mother was in the next room starved for affection from men who would give her nothing but pain. If she had stayed with Laguna, if they had been happy, perhaps she would have never met Kato, and maybe none of the abuse he had been put through would have ever happened. Perhaps he would have been able to have a normal childhood, instead of this sick piece of psychotic madness. The thought angered Squall so much that it choked him. But then he felt Seifer's strong hand on his shoulder, and that simple gesture managed to diffuse the violent glint of hatred glowing within him, at least for the time being.

Squall's head streaked to the side, and without a word, he moved away from the blond's touch and begun to ascend the staircase to Seifer's apartment. He could hear the other two males talking as they followed him up the steep, windswept steps, and although he loathed himself for his own, immature curiosity, Squall couldn't help but listen in to their conversation.

"Is she here yet?" he heard Laguna asking, and Squall noted that elevated, hopeful pitch to the man's inflection with an irrational stab of anger.

"No, but she should be on her way shortly," Seifer muttered in response. "Squall called her a few minutes ago."

The dark haired man lowered his voice suspiciously, murmuring a concerned "How is he doing?"

"Eh... well..." the blond mused, screwing up his face, "He hasn't killed anyone yet, so I guess he's holding up alright."

Laguna nodded, looking relieved. "Did he say anything to his mother when he talked to her?"

"No," Seifer said, shaking his head. "He didn't say anything. She doesn't know you're here."

Only stiff silence followed that statement, and Squall continued to walk until he had reached Seifer's apartment. Staring at the door in a focused, near obsessive manner, he completely ignored Laguna's presence somewhere behind him. They waited quietly until Seifer had unlocked his front door and finally led them inside, into his dark living room. As the blond switched on the lights, Squall found his new favorite canine, Shiva, sitting in the middle of the front room, apparently waiting for them in anticipation, and he quickly walked up to greet her.

"Shiva," the brunette whispered affectionately as he knelt down beside her and pressed his face into her warm, furry neck with a sigh of relief. He sat like that for several moments, just breathing in and out, cherishing her presence. The beautiful Malamute managed to instill him with that same sense of comfort and security that Griever had once given him, before his violent and untimely death.

'_Griever. I... miss him... so much. He was the most amazing dog, and he was so much more than that. He was... my best friend. He'd still be here if it wasn't for Kato. I can't believe the bastard__ killed my dog... for no reason at all. He's a monster, and he was never anything else but that. I don't think there's just one grain of goodness in him. I hate him. I hate him so much I want him to fucking die.'_

As his thoughts drifted into that whole _world_ of hatred he harbored towards his stepfather, Squall suddenly felt something heavy and soft being nonchalantly thrown over his face. The action startled him and he jerked in response, but when he reached up in suspicion, he merely found a towel, as well as Seifer's hand, resting on top of his head.

"Hey. Dry yourself off," the blond ordered in a husky and oddly persuasive voice as he casually ruffled Squall's damp hair. "You're freezing."

Indeed, when the blond withdrew his touch and stepped away, Squall instantly noticed how every muscle in his body was shuddering involuntarily. The cold had penetrated his skin and bones, and the warmth of Seifer's apartment wasn't reaching him through the thick, wet coat he was wearing.

"Let me look at your hands, too," Seifer added from somewhere across the room, causing the kneeling brunette to throw a blank gaze at his own knuckles, which were covered with a thin, dried coating of blood. Most of the offending body fluid had already rubbed off on his shirt and pants, and quite honestly, Squall had long forgotten about the superficial, painless wounds.

"I'm fine. It's nothing," the brunette grumbled hoarsely as he straightened up, removing Laguna's coat and toweling off his hair in a static sort of way. Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see the journalist from Esthar giving him a probing look-over, and for some reason, the concept bothered him on a deeper level.

"Listen, Squall—"

"I'm going to use the restroom," Squall cut his blond classmate off abruptly, and he didn't wait around to give Seifer a chance to finish his sentence. He ignored both males as he dropped the black pea coat on a nearby dresser and trotted into Seifer's bedroom, from where he proceeded into the brightly lit bathroom.

He tossed the damp towel onto a pile of dirty laundry in a corner of the room and stopped in front of the sink to grip the edge of the cool, white porcelain. He took long, slow breaths deep into his lungs, while leaning forward and fixing the drain below him with a weird, empty stare. When Squall eventually tilted his head upwards, he caught his own eyes in the mirror in front of him, and almost out of reflex, his formerly emotionless expression turned into a scowl.

'_... What the hell am I doing?'_

As he studied his own reflection very thoroughly, there was a sudden, uncomfortable tightness in his stomach when he came to fully understand that Seifer definitely hadn't imagined the physical similarities between him and Laguna. The journalist's skin was more tan than his own, his eye color was off and his haircut was different, yet despite all that, Squall had to admit that he could see Loire's face in his own. Their features were nearly identical, and there was little but age that seemed to separate them. Their bone structure, their lips, their eyes, their noses... they could all belong to the same person – the same fucking _family._

And for the first time, it truly hit him who was waiting back there in that living room.

'_Oh, my god. He really** is** my father.'_

As Squall was blindsided by that realization, his head went spinning, and he backed up against the nearest wall. His stomach contents were lurching up into his throat, and he could feel himself getting physically ill. Tears stung his eyes as he pressed one hand in front of his mouth, trying not to vomit. He could hear the blood rushing to his head, amplifying the white noise in his mind.

'_Oh, god... W-what am I doing... This is horrible. It's completely insane. I can't do this. __**I can't**__. I'm going to ruin __**everything**! __My mom didn't want me to meet him. She didn't __**want**__ to see him again! I'm doing everything all wrong! This was **never **supposed to happen.'_

As the deep, piercing spike of panic settled in his heart at last, Squall did the only thing that his young, frightened self could come up with – and that was to run away as fast and far as he possibly could. As he bolted from Seifer's bathroom in a blind, thoughtless frenzy, he hectically made his way to the front door on legs that had suddenly become unsteady. He didn't hear or see much of anything as he stormed through the living-room and snapped a hysterical, "I-I gotta go...!"

His hand found the door handle and forced it open, and just like that, he vanished into the darkness. When he stepped outside, he felt a sudden rush of ice cold air stinging in his windpipe, and like a punch in the chest, it knocked the breath out of him momentarily. The world around him had become white and silent, not only because of the snow that had started to cover everything in sight, but because his mind had become so filled with panic that it was gradually shutting down. As he fought for a breath and just one rational thought amongst all the chaos, he suddenly felt somebody's fingers grabbing his hand.

Squall spun on the spot, feeling those fingers releasing him, then clutching him once more around his elbow. When he focused his erratic gaze, he realized that Seifer was standing in front of him, backlit by the warm light of his apartment, looking like everything that Squall had ever wanted and _needed,_ but had always been too afraid to ask for. Seifer was strong and fearless and imposing, but most of all he was _there_, despite everything that had happened between them in the past. The blond's face was serious, but kind, and there was patience there that was quite exceptional for his age.

Staring at Seifer was all Squall could do to keep himself from breaking down even further.

"Where are you going?" Seifer finally asked simply, without sarcasm or reprimand to his tone, and he was still holding the brunette's arm, although his grasp could have easily been broken if Squall had only half tried. They weren't standing very far apart, and Seifer could feel the cold, moist fog of Squall's breath against his own skin. The dark haired boy was panting, and he was staring at him with the rushed, exhausted appearance of someone who had been running away from something for a very long time.

"I can't," Squall finally gasped in a tarnished voice, grimacing, "I can't do this. I can't."

Seifer cocked his head very slightly, looking almost curious. Very calmly, he asked, "Why not?"

"Because I _can't_! You don't understand," the brunette groaned, shaking his head. "I can't do this! _I can't_! I don't... I don't have the _right_ to do this."

"Why would you say that?" Seifer inquired stoically. "That's not true, and you know that. Of course you have the right to do this. Laguna had a right to know about you, and you have the right to know the truth. You always did."

"It's not that simple!" Squall snapped, now sounding exasperate. "Don't you get it? My mother didn't _want_ me to meet him! If she did, she would have introduced us a long time ago! She wouldn't want this, I'm sure of it! What I'm doing here is wrong!"

"Tell me, Squall... Do you ever think about _yourself_ instead of always worrying about others?" the blond asked bluntly, and he shook his head at the brunette. "Even if you're right and your mother didn't want you guys to know about each other, fate obviously had something different planned for you. It doesn't matter if this is what your mother wanted, because _this_ is out of her control, and it's out of _your_ control, too. It's too late to change what happened, Squall. You can only move forward and deal with it at this point."

"No, I can still go back, I can still—"

"Honestly, who are you trying to fool here?" Seifer sighed, the gentleness in his deep, husky voice taking the sting out of the purely rhetorical question. "You're seventeen years old. You know better than that. You know that just because you pretend something doesn't exist doesn't mean it's going to go away."

Squall screwed up his face, wincing, "But—"

"Squall, it's okay," the blond murmured, while moving his hand up to Squall's upper arm and giving it a long, slow squeeze. "Stop panicking. Just let it happen. You're doing nothing wrong."

"It's not that simple," Squall repeated stubbornly, shaking his head yet again. Seifer could feel him tensing up, considering to make a break for it once more.

He was tired of watching Squall run away, tired of chasing after him and trying to make him stay. He could fully understand the brunette's fears, but that didn't mean he was going to allow his friend to immerse himself in them.

It was time the dark haired boy realized just how strong he truly was.

"Listen... I know it's not that simple, okay? I know," the blond continued with patience, and he was holding Squall's flickering gaze with his own. "I know it's probably the most difficult decision you ever had to make. You're the proudest and strongest and most stubborn guy I've ever met, and I can tell that this is _killing_ you."

"Then why—"

"But," Seifer swiftly interrupted the other boy's protests, "If that man really _is _your father, or even if he isn't, then you have a right to know the _truth_. You deserve to know the story of your birth. You shouldn't have to wonder who your father is, or why he wasn't there when you grew up. It's not fair. You deserve better than that. This is _your_ story, and you have the right to know where it began."

"B-but still... What if he's not a good guy?" Squall asked weakly, not so easily swayed by Seifer's arguments. "What if that's the reason she didn't want me to meet him?"

"Is that really what you think?" Seifer retorted sagely, willing to acknowledge Squall's concern, even though he did not share it. "It's possible that he isn't a good guy, yeah, but I believe your mother has better judgment than that."

"She's been wrong before," the brunette muttered darkly, a shade of disgust to his tone, and there was something in his eyes that Seifer didn't understand.

"What do you mean by that?" he asked, narrowing his eyes. His grip on Squall's arm tightened.

"Nothing," the brunette shot back evasively as he turned his head away, diffusing the hidden seriousness of his initial comment. "All I'm saying is that she's made bad choices in the past. Some of the men she's dated have been a real special breed of assholes."

"Well... Everybody makes mistakes," Seifer reminded him gently. "That doesn't mean every man she's ever dated has been a fuck-up. Look, take this for what it's worth, but I really don't think Laguna is a bad guy. I would've never brought him back here with us if I thought there was something fishy about him. He seems like a decent man with decent intentions."

"Even if he is," Squall agreed reluctantly, "What if I ruin my mother's marriage by doing this?"

Seifer raised an eyebrow in incredulity. Even after all this time and all the fights he'd had with the difficult brunette, he was still genuinely amazed by the many strange dimensions that were part of Squall's intricate thought process. Just how and where did the brunette come up with these things?

"Squall... why would you ruin her marriage? That's ridiculous," the blond announced, ignoring the sudden glint of anger in Squall's eyes. "You have nothing to do with your mother's marriage, okay? Even if your mother decides that she'd rather be with Laguna than your stepfather after all these seventeen plus years, it would be her choice, and her's alone. She's an adult. Quit making her decisions your responsibility, because they _aren't_. And frankly, Laguna seems like a better choice than your stepfather, anyway, but I guess that's not my place to say."

He noticed something twitching in Squall's face, but for all he knew, it could just be the freezing cold. Seifer thought it was stupid for them to be standing outside in the snow like two royal idiots in the first place, but if it was distance from Laguna and some room to breathe that Squall needed in order to calm down and keep from walling himself in, then he would comply, at least for now.

"... What about Ell?" Squall finally asked, and his voice had softened with a shade of near childish insecurity.

"What about her?" Seifer retorted impatiently, finally becoming weary of Squall's irrational arguments. "What are you worried about? Okay, I get it – she's not an adult, like your mother, and I know you feel protective of her, but no matter what happens tonight, she's still your sister. She'll _always_ be your sister. Nothing can change that. You always knew you had different fathers, and I'm sure she'd want you to know who yours is. She's young, but she loves you. Give her some credit. Give _yourself_ some credit. You made the right decision, trust me."

This time, the brunette remained silent, and his gaze slowly drifted off. He was shivering in the chill of the winter breeze that was hitting Seifer's apartment building full on, and after a few moments of watching the brunette shaking with near violent intensity, Seifer finally let out a sigh and pulled the unwilling boy against him.

"Honestly, you're such a fuckin' worry wart," he whispered with a subtle hint of humor to his voice, while rubbing his right hand up and down Squall's spine to provide him warmth. His left arm was curled around the dark haired boy's shoulders, and he was relieved to register no resistance from the younger teen at all. The brunette simply stood there, tense and on edge as always, but he made no attempt at breaking their intimate physical contact.

All in all, Seifer figured, they'd really come an awful long way from their very first and very hateful encounter in that high school parking lot.

_'Who ever would have thought that we'd be here today, like this, all in love and shit? I sure the hell didn't. I honestly thought he'd have driven me insane by now, but I guess... I understand him more than I ever thought I did.'_

After a few blissful moments of them simply surrendering themselves to the feeling of their bodies pressing against each other, Squall forced himself to return to the reality of the situation. No matter how much he just wanted to stand there and see and feel and think about nothing but Seifer, he knew that tonight's task was far from accomplished.

Just what was he supposed to do? He thought that he knew, but every time things seemed clear to him, the feeling seemed to slip from his grasp.

Eventually, he shifted in Seifer's embrace and let out a small groan of discomfort.

"Seifer," he murmured, the name muffled by the blond's shirt, "I know all of this probably sounds stupid as fuck to you, but... I just... I don't know what to do. I don't know. I have no idea. I'm worried that I'm doing everything wrong here. I'm not like you. This... isn't easy for me."

"Of course it isn't," Seifer acknowledged. "It wouldn't be easy for anyone. But you're handling it a lot better than I ever could, I'll tell you that. I admire you for that."

The brunette breathed a snort against Seifer's shoulder. "Now you're bullshitting me."

"Nah, not at all... I just love the _shit_ out of you," Seifer chuckled, happy to note a spark of sarcasm over Squall's formerly flat affect. "Sue me, princess bride, but all in all, I think you're pretty fuckin' awesome."

Squall made a raw, indistinct sound low in his throat to that compliment, but said nothing else. In a delicately affectionate way, he placed his forehead against the crook of Seifer's warm neck, and the other boy's muscular body blocked out the wind and the cold and the frostiness in the brunette's scarred heart.

"What if..." Squall finally whispered coarsely, the words filled with uncertainty, "What if... he really is my father?"

Seifer pondered that question for a moment as he stared off into the darkness, almost as if to acknowledge its gravity. His broad arms continued to hold Squall in an attempt to provide the dark haired teen with comfort and a sense of safety that he clearly seemed to be lacking.

"If that man really is your father," Seifer started slowly, "Then... it's your choice what you want to do with that. You're not a child anymore. Nobody can make that decision for you now. Whether you want him in your life or not is entirely up to you."

"But... it's not just about me and what _I _want. Maybe Laguna doesn't want a son," Squall suggested, and Seifer could hear a more profound shade of the boy's nagging doubts in his voice.

"Honestly, if that was the case, I don't think he'd still be here right now," the blond informed him wisely. He brought one hand to the back of the brunette's head to run it through that damp, tangled mess of deep brown hair as he breathed into Squall's ear. "If he didn't want a son, that dude would've hightailed it out of here the moment he found out you were seventeen and Raine's kid."

"But he—"

"Squall, listen to me," Seifer interrupted him, his tone stern as he lowered his face to Squall's and met the other boy's eyes, his hand now clutching the nape of the smaller boy's neck. The brunette was so defensive, so afraid of emotional dependence, that it was truly heartbreaking. He always had that cold, incredibly proud and cynical glint in his storm grey eyes, even now, almost as if he wanted to make sure that nobody would think he might possibly give a shit.

How could anyone live like that, without cracking under the pressure of always pretending to be completely out of reach?

'_... They __**can't**__. That's exactly the point here. He's come to a place in his life where he can't go on like this. Something needs to happen, before he ends up killing himself.'_

"Squall," the blond repeated his classmate's name, while holding the brunette's piercing gaze with his own, "I know you're a whole hell of a lot smarter than I ever will be, but just this one time, _listen to me_. I have _seen_ how that guy looks at you, okay? I saw his face when he found out you might be his son. Squall, the man is in _fucking awe_."

Squall's eyes widened momentarily, and Seifer noticed him swallowing as his jaw dropped slightly. There was an undeniable vulnerability in the dark haired teen's gaze – a small spark of boyhood innocence and longing for a family that he had never been able to call his own. Seifer had never seen him look so defenseless, so much like a child. He could feel that same untainted affection, that same fierce urge to protect stirring within him that he imagined a father would have to feel for his son, although when everything was said and done, Seifer's love was of an entirely different and much more physical magnitude.

"... Let's go back inside," the blond finally ordered with a sigh, almost hastily turning Squall around and giving him a gentle, but firm shove towards the door. He knew the gesture had to seem abrupt to Squall, but he didn't want to give him too much room to argue. They had stayed out in the cold for far too long already, anyway; their ears and noses were pink from the winter chill, and their hair frosted with a fine dusting of snow. As he steered Squall into the warmth of his apartment, the brunette glanced back at him from over his shoulder, and Seifer merely gave him a smile that said more than a thousand words ever could have.

'_You'll be alright, I promise you. You're strong. You're stronger than anyone I know. You can do __**anything**__. And I'll always be here to remind you of that, even when you yourself have forgotten.'_

He noticed with satisfaction how Squall's face finally set when the brunette turned his head once more, looking grim and fearless as usual. Apparently, Squall wasn't willing to show Laguna that same unguarded side of his that he had just given Seifer a very small and intimate snapshot of.

'_... Guess I can't blame him. Besides... he's not exactly the trusting type, and I don't think he ever will be. But that's alright, too.'_

When they set foot inside the living room, they found Laguna sitting on the armrest of Seifer's couch, absentmindedly petting Shiva on the head. Both the man and the dog looked up at the sound of their arrival; Laguna almost seemed startled, and his green-blue eyes searched Seifer's face, before finally setting on Squall with a certain kind of skittishness.

"... You kids are soaked," the reporter remarked vaguely, lowering his brows in disapproval when he took in the fact that Squall was only wearing his thin, long sleeved t-shirt.

"Eh... Yeah, you got a point there, I guess. Hey, Squall, sit tight, I'll get you another towel," Seifer declared, carefully glancing back and forth between Laguna and his younger look-alike, as if to gauge whether it was safe to leave them alone with each other. Pleased with what he saw, the blond ultimately disappeared into his bedroom, closely followed by his dog Shiva.

Laguna continued to stare at the dark haired boy who was still standing across the room, looking back at him with that same watchful, almost reprimanding gaze he had seen on Raine so many times when he had done something she didn't approve of. He didn't know what Seifer had told the boy to make him stay, but he was thankful all the same. He knew that Squall was the key to whatever had happened between him and the brunette's mother almost two decades ago, and he had to solve this mystery once and for all. Their breakup had haunted him for many years, put him through many sleepless nights, and finally, he could see the light at the end of a long, dark tunnel filled with questions and insecurities and doubts over his own adequacy.

Of course, he was aware that this whole experience had to be traumatizing for the brunette teenager, and he felt regret over having to put the boy through it all. He couldn't possibly imagine what it had to feel like to be seventeen years old and run into a man who claimed to be his mother's former lover and quite possibly his father, but he figured that it probably felt pretty close to hell on earth.

If only there was something he could do to make it easier.

"Squall—"

"Why are you here?"

Laguna broke off immediately, blinking at the abrupt harshness in Squall's voice when he practically barked that question in his direction. The boy was standing with his arms crossed in front of his chest defensively, staring at him with the air of someone who wasn't easily fooled by pretty words or empty promises. For a moment, Laguna wondered whether he was imagining the fact that Squall looked like a deeply broken and maltreated young man who was using his tough exterior to hide secrets that were far too dark to divulge. In the end, however, he had to cast that thought aside, at least for now, simply because the concept bothered him much more than he could stand.

He hardly even knew the kid, and there was no official confirmation of their familiar bond as of yet, but Laguna already felt more protective over the brunette than he figured he should have.

'_I guess... I always wondered what it would feel like to be a father. All in all... this isn't what I had expected. It's different, and yet... more powerful of a feeling than anything I'd imagined.'_

"Why the hell are you here?" Squall repeated, more impatiently this time as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He looked oddly restless.

Eventually, Laguna cocked his head and answered with all the truthfulness he could muster, "I'm here because I think I should be."

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" Squall shot back irritably. He was honestly trying to give the man a chance, trying to allow him to explain himself and earn his right to meet Raine after all that had happened, but right now, every facet of Laguna's behavior was doing nothing but piss him off further.

"Well... on a more selfish level, I guess, I'm here because I'm curious. I... want to know the truth," Laguna continued vaguely, not entirely sure if that was the answer Squall was waiting for.

"I don't _care_ about your curiosity," the brunette boy hissed, lashing out with his right arm and carelessly hitting a nearby wall, his volatile attitude catching Laguna off guard once more. "I want to know what you're planning to do once you find out the truth! Why are you here? What are you hoping to get out of this? _That's _what I want to know. That's all I fucking care about."

For a few moments, Laguna simply gazed at the dark haired youth, intensely contemplating the scared hatefulness he saw in the brunette's grey blue eyes. He wondered just what exactly Squall had been through to make him so leery towards other human beings and their intentions.

'_I wonder... if some of this is my fault?'_

"I always wanted to know what I did to make Raine disappear," Laguna explained quietly, never allowing his patience with the boy to waver. "And once I know what it was that I did or _didn't_ do to cause her to leave me... I am going to take responsibility."

"... Responsibility?"

Squall's voice had suddenly become much less rough and much more confused. Laguna could see the insecurity in his expression, his deep desire to understand and his frustration over being unable to. While the reporter considered explaining his words further, he noticed that some of the scab on the knuckles of Squall's right hand had broken when he had struck the wall, causing them to bleed once more.

'_I'm starting to get the impression that he doesn't care about being in pain... Honestly, what a reckless kid.'_

"Your hand is bleeding again," Laguna informed the teenager, nodding demonstratively in the direction of Squall's lowered right hand. "Do you mind if I take a look at it?"

Looking slightly surprised, Squall raised his hand to his face. He gazed at it very intensely for a moment, as if contemplating something of great importance, before he suddenly spun around and disappeared in the kitchen without a word.

"Uh, Squall...?"

Bewildered, Laguna slowly got up from the couch and followed the boy behind the counters. He found Squall standing in front of the sink, holding both of his hands under running water. Laguna watched him silently from a few feet away, not really intending to interfere, until the brunette suddenly reached for a nearby plastic bottle of bright white dish soap that obviously contained bleach. As Squall nonchalantly turned it upside down to squeeze some of the harsh detergent into his hands, he suddenly noticed the overbearing presence of someone close behind him, and before he knew it, someone had grabbed his right forearm and taken the bottle of soap from his unsuspecting grasp.

"Don't put that on there."

Startled, Squall twisted around, finding a pair of green-blue eyes studying him with a kind of caring, yet scolding intensity to them. Laguna was holding his arm with one hand and the dish soap with the other, their bodies touching at the shoulder and hip without either of them even being aware of it. For a few seconds, the dark haired boy simply stared back at Laguna in a drawn out blank, apparently unsure whether he should be thankful or offended.

Laguna wasn't particularly surprised when the teenager ultimately opted for the latter of the two options.

"What are you doing?" Squall hissed sharply, abruptly trying to yank his right arm back while throwing the man a well-placed death glare. The reporter had a decent hold on the young man's leather wrist band, which he could feel sliding beneath his fingertips as Squall forcefully attempted to reclaim his limb.

"Nothing. I'm just worried about you," Laguna explained, deliberately staying calm when his younger opposite obviously could not.

When Squall continued to look infuriated and unwilling, Laguna sighed and murmured, "C'mon. Just let me see."

The journalist's attentive eyes cut downwards to throw a quick, observant glance at the boy's lower arm. He managed to catch just a glimpse of strange, barely visible white and reddish lines etched into the inside of the seventeen year old's wrist, before Squall had suddenly jumped backwards as if slapped in the face.

"Get your hands off me!" the boy yelped, the pitch of his voice almost hysterical. Laguna had let go of his arm in surprise, and Squall was pressing it against his chest, almost as if to keep his wounds out of sight. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes were flaring, fixing Laguna with an expression situated somewhere between paranoia and outrage.

"Squall, what—" Laguna started, shock swinging in his voice. He looked stunned by what he had just seen, but before he could inquire further, Seifer had suddenly come bolting into the kitchen, ready to deliver a beating to anyone who would dare to hurt Squall.

"Hey, what the _hell_ do you think you're doing?" an overprotective Seifer yelled, excitedly brandishing a towel as he was pointing one finger at Laguna. His burning gaze, however, was focused entirely on Squall. "Squall! Squall, are you okay?"

The dark haired boy screwed up his face, and he was still cradling his arm against his torso. Seifer noticed him haphazardly trying to adjust the fit of his leather band around his right wrist.

"I'm fine," the brunette snarled acidly, while glaring at the journalist from Esthar with contempt.

Laguna, who was normally very easily distracted, still seemed stuck on the unexpected discovery he had just made on Squall's body. His bright eyes kept darting calculating looks between the young brunette's face and his arm, as if trying to confirm some kind of mental connection. Squall seemed to be throwing up a hasty barricade of resentment and hostility, but Laguna still noticed the panicked fright in every one of the boy's movements and expressions, and he knew precisely what that meant.

Apparently, Laguna had seen something that Squall had very much intended to keep private.

"Squall. Why do you have those scars on your wrist?" the man asked with a frown as he took a cautious step towards the dark haired boy, completely disregarding Seifer's threatening presence behind him, by the front door.

Squall immediately backed away from him, towards a nearby table, his jaw trembling with anger as he spat, "W-what... that's none of your fucking business! Who do you think you are?"

"What?" Seifer's stunned voice suddenly piped up. "You saw...?"

Judging by the disbelieving intonation of the blond's words and his open-ended question, Laguna could tell that Squall's scars were no news to the older teenager. Seifer was watching both of them unsurely from the entrance to the kitchen, no longer appearing as aggressive as he had only seconds ago. For a very unsettling moment, Laguna wondered what other dirty little secrets the two boys were possibly keeping from the rest of the world, but before he had the opportunity to ask, his train of thought was completely derailed by the unexpected sound of the doorbell.

The reporter could hear Squall making an indistinct sound of surprise somewhere behind him, and even Seifer had bit off a muttered curse word.

They all knew what this meant.

'_**Raine**.'_

"Squall... uh... I think it's your mother..." Seifer whispered after a few seconds of all three of them staring at the door in alarm. When he turned around, he found that both Laguna and Squall had paled a few shades. They looked like deer caught in the headlights, their heated argument and Squall's self-inflicted scars apparently forgotten as they were abruptly forced to confront their age old fears.

For a moment, time seemed to have stopped entirely, leaving Seifer with way too much room to deliberate on his next move.

'_Shit. __What should I do? It's not too late yet... I can still stop this.'_

Thoughts of never answering the door and putting an end to this before it had even begun crossed Seifer's mind, but it only lasted a brief second. Deep down, he knew what he had to do. The two brunettes in the room both seemed powerless, unable and unwilling to move. They both stared at the door in stunned silence, not knowing and yet fearing what was going to happen next.

Neither of them would make the first step.

'_... No. I have no choice. If I don't do this, neither of them will. We got this far, we can't just stop here. Squall needs to know what really happened before he was born, or he'll never be happy, because he'll always wonder who his father is, even if he won't admit it. He'll always feel like he was abandoned, or some kind of accident... like his father didn't want him and his life isn't worth living. I can't watch him go through that anymore. It's enough. He's fuckin' killing himself. It's time for him to find out the truth. Once and for all.'_

Seifer took a last appraising glance at the other two males, noting that Laguna had turned a classic shade of green and Squall had retreated a few inches towards the far end of the kitchen, looking hunted and scared, ready to make a swift exit if given half a chance. Still, despite his obvious discomfort, he was there, gathering his last bits of failing courage around himself, steeling himself for a situation he had never truly thought he would have to face.

'_I'm sorry, Squall. I have to do this. I'm sure... you'll understand.'_

And with that resolution dominating his mind, Seifer finally opened the door.


	32. Memory of a Tragedy

-:-**  
****Chapter 32  
****Memory of a Tragedy**

"_You're not fine, and I know that it's my fault. It's always been my fault."_

-:-

I want to hold you

Protect you from all of the things I've already endured

I want to show you

Show you all the things that this life has in store for you

I'll always love you.

_"Zoe Jane" - STAIND_

-:-

_Today was my sixteenth birthday._

_I got so many presents with hundreds of little bows on them that Ell picked out and stuck everywhere with super glue, Mom baked a chocolate cake, we took Griever to the park... and I bought myself a motorcycle. It really wasn't a bad day at all. _

_Still... _

_Even though it was my birthday, all I really wanted was to kill myself. _

_... No, I guess when everything is said and done, it's not that I want to kill myself... I want __**him **__to die. I want him to die before he can touch me just one more time, because at this point, I don't think I can take any more of this._

_I'm just... so tired._

_... Why am I here?_

_What am I doing?_

_I'm a year older, but nothing has changed. Am I even supposed to be here? Am I supposed to be alive? Maybe I was meant to die a long time ago. Maybe my mother defied destiny by letting me live._

_Maybe Kato is just finishing the job._

_I try to smile and look happy for them, because I know it's what they want to see, but everything inside me is so fucking empty that I feel like my heart is rotting in the void of my own chest._

_I wish I knew why I'm alive. I wish I knew my place in this world. I wish I knew what really happened before I was born. I wish I knew why I have to go through this agony every day after fucking day._

_I wish I knew how to make it __**stop**__._

_Sometimes, I wonder who is worse... Kato, or my father. Who is more of a monster? Is there even an answer to that question? I suppose... at least Kato acknowledges the fact that I exist._

_... God, what am I saying._

_Has it really come down to this? Am I really that fucked up?_

_Sometimes, when it's really dark and quiet around me, and I can hear nothing but my own thoughts inside my head, I dream of my father coming to save me... I dream that he'll take me away from all of this, right before I go completely insane. A knight in shining armor without a face, who probably wants me dead as much as I want to kill him for all he has done to me and my mother._

_... What's wrong with me?_

_How can I want to kill him, yet want him to save me at the same time? It's so absurd and perverse, it doesn't make any sense at all. I completely realize that, and yet it doesn't change the way I feel._

_... Maybe I've gone insane a long time ago._

_Sixteen years and sixteen birthday candles later, he still hasn't called and he still hasn't accepted the consequences of his own actions. He hasn't apologized to my mother for all of her heartbreak and tears, and he hasn't asked my forgiveness for disappearing from my life before I was even born. There were so many holidays, so many memories... and he wasn't a part of any of them. He never even bothered. All he left me with were hundreds of quiet, empty nights I spent wondering why I wasn't good enough._

_It hurt. So fucking much. _

_Nothing has ever hurt as much as knowing that my own father didn't want me – not even Kato raping me, or the razor blades burning through my skin, or the fact that I have to hide it all from my own, clueless mother. _

_Nothing even compares._

_... In the end, however, none of that even matters._

_Because all I really want is for him to tell me that maybe... just maybe..._

_He still loved me all along._

The moment that Seifer opened the front door to his apartment, everything around and within Squall went silent. Every thought and memory were suddenly muted in his head, leaving him with nothing but the striking fear reverberating in his own heart with every single, desperate beat. He didn't know that all blood had left his face long ago, turning his skin a concerning, pasty white and his eyes a burning shade of grey. He watched that door opening in what seemed like a painful slow motion, witnessing how his mother's slender figure came within sight inside the entryway. She looked beautiful, just as she always did, her long, sweeping hair dark and soft and her face so incredibly kind and oblivious. She had one arm wrapped around her own figure and was carrying her favorite insulated coffee mug, beaming at Seifer as the tall blond muttered something incomprehensible and clumsily motioned her inside.

"My goodness, it's cold out there!" Squall could hear his mother exclaiming with a bright laugh, and he noticed a faint dusting of snow on her shoulders and the top of her head as she playfully shook herself like a wet puppy dog. All the while, however, his gaze remained fixed upon her delicate face with an almost paranoid kind of intensity.

That woman was his everything, half the reason Squall had even bothered to keep living this long in the first place, and he was about to turn her world upside down.

From here on out, _nothing_ would ever be the same, and he would never forgive himself for what he had done.

"Seifer, honey, how are you?"

Seifer stared at his female guest vacantly as he closed the door behind her, trying to voice some kind of response to her fond greeting, but all that came out was a jumbled pile of garbage. As he was stuttering like a classical retard, the blond noticed Raine's cobalt blue eyes searching the apartment, and when her curious gaze finally fell on her son, her smile widened.

"Oh, Squall, there you—"

Her clear, excited voice died the very same instant she realized that Squall wasn't alone in the kitchen. There was a stranger - a tall, handsome dark haired man - standing quietly next to her son, looking precisely like an older carbon copy of her very own offspring, and that startling realization caused her brows to lift. She stared at the man in a moment of stunned silence, and despite the many years that had passed and all the tender memories that had been buried along the way, she recognized his face the very second she laid eyes on it.

"... Oh, my god."

Squall flinched when the plastic coffee mug his mother had been carrying hit the floor, spilling its dark contents in a wide arc as it rolled across the tiles with a hollow clattering noise. Raine had paled to a stark shade of white, and there was a manic, helpless kind of shock in her eyes as she clutched both of her hands in front of her mouth.

Seifer, who was still lingering next to the shell-shocked woman, edgily glanced from her to the two brunette males standing awkwardly in the middle of the kitchen. Squall seemed to have shrunk, looking small and horrified as he was leaning backwards against the counter, his arms clutched to his body in defense. Laguna, too, appeared to be scared stiff, although there was a certain innocent, awestruck rapture to his expression that made him look very much like a teenager. The man was staring back at his childhood sweetheart in silent, wide-eyed expectation, and he honestly considered uttering some kind of clumsy greeting, but when he saw the tears streaking down the ethereal woman's face, Laguna's throat suddenly became too tight to breathe.

"It's you..." they could hear the woman whisper in a voice that was little more than a shaky breath filled with disbelief. "Oh, my god. It really _is_ _you_."

Squall was watching his mother from afar, stunned and moved when he saw her being overcome with so much gut wrenching emotion. There was happiness in her eyes that completely defied everyone's expectations, especially his own. Obviously, she had recognized Laguna at first sight, proving that the man had told the truth about their shared past all along. Squall hadn't particularly believed that Laguna had been lying to them, but this wasn't what he had anticipated to happen. Perhaps he had expected outrage, bitterness, disappointment or even loathing from his mother. Really, it had been anything but _this_. There was something in Raine's expression that Squall had never seen on her before; a rare, profound glow of affection and a deep, desperately harbored longing that startled the brunette boy far more than anything else possibly could have.

His mother _loved_ this man. She truly, honestly loved him. After all these years and all the misery he had put her through, she looked so madly in love with him that even a blind man could have seen it.

It was more than his young, tortured mind could stand.

When Squall felt his stomach flipping, he pressed one hand flat to his mouth and yanked his head around, away from his mother and everyone else's attentive eyes. His heart seemed to be pounding somewhere in his throat, near his Adam's apple, and it was going a million miles per hour. The ground seemed to be spinning out from underneath him as blood rushed to his head, but just as he feared that he was going to either vomit or pass out, he felt someone grabbing his left upper arm and calling his name, ripping him back to reality.

"Squall! Squall, are you alright?"

He swayed, finding both Seifer and Laguna hovering by his side, with the older man clutching his body, which had apparently been thrown visibly off balance. The brunette let out a few quick gasps in an attempt to compose himself, while glaring at the reporter from Esthar unwillingly.

"I'm fine," he bit, hastily freeing himself from Laguna's grasp. The man respectfully backed off a few inches, although there was a strange blend of disappointment and reluctance on his face.

"Squall..."

The dark haired teenager looked up when he heard his mother's choked voice. She still stood by the door, motionless like a statue, completely thunderstruck. She kept darting rushed looks between her son and her former lover, Laguna, flinching when she fully appreciated the visual similarities between them, realizing what she had done.

"You... You and... Laguna? H-_how_...?" the woman finally stammered, her whole body shaking with apprehension. "How did you... How... How is this p-possible, how..."

Squall stared back at her, devoid of an answer to her question. He himself had no idea anymore how it had come down to this... how Laguna Loire had entered the center stage of all of their lives. He thought that he had known, at some point, but right now his head was so crowded with thoughts and emotions that it felt paradoxically empty at the same time. He didn't know what to do, much less what to say. Years ago, when he had been younger and had secretly daydreamed about meeting his father, this wasn't at all what he had imagined; he had always envisioned something happier, something less dramatic, and not nearly as uncomfortable.

"Raine..." the dark haired man from Esthar finally said, her name sounding so otherworldly when called from his tongue. She was returning his gaze from the other side of the kitchen, more tears streaming down her face as she hiccoughed and trembled. As nearly two decades of separation between them melted away, Laguna wished for nothing more than to lunge across the room and hold her, but he was wise enough to understand that this was neither the time, nor the place for such grand gestures of affection.

Right now, he had to find out the truth. There'd be more hours and more days to reminisce about times long gone, and although he had so many things that he wanted to ask her, right now, there was only one question that truly mattered.

Only one.

"Raine," he whispered her name once more, swallowing as his eyes averted from her slender frame to that of her son. Squall was leaning sideways against the kitchen counter, grimacing at him in open, hostile mistrust, his skin still disturbingly pale and his dark eyes flashing almost challengingly.

Laguna didn't know if he was ready for this, if he had _ever_ been ready for it, but he _did_ know that he had waited and suffered for far too long to simply turn back now.

"Raine," the reporter repeated, but the pitch of his voice had suddenly changed. He had never spoken words that had been more difficult or more important. Nothing in his life had ever mattered as much as this. "... Is he mine?"

His stern, questioning, yet equally intimidated gaze streaked from Squall to his mother in mute inquisition, noticing how she flinched and let out a small, indistinct sob when she fully understood the question. Her eyes were burning red with shame and regret, filling up with tears once more as she looked upon her oldest child with a love that was as pure as the newly fallen snow outside Seifer's front door. She loved that boy more than her own life, more than her own happiness, more than the man who was standing only an insignificant distance away from her.

It was the kind of powerful, unselfish love that only a parent could comprehend.

And for once in his life, Laguna, the scarred man who'd warily questioned every emotion that had ever crossed his path in nearly two decades, was finally flooded with an understanding of what that kind of love truly was when she slowly nodded her head.

"Y... Y-yes. H-he... He's _yours_. He's your son."

As those words left her lips for the very first time in almost eighteen years, Squall could hear something within his own mind snapping. As much as he had thought that he had been prepared to receive confirmation for what he had deep down already known anyway, there was nothing that could have readied him for the storm that was suddenly unleashed inside his heart. He stood there in that kitchen, watching his world set on fire, and there wasn't a thing that he could do to stop it.

Then, through the pain and the fury and all the other emotions he couldn't even place, he suddenly felt someone's hand grasping his own, holding him so tight that he thought his fingers might break from the force of the touch. As he dropped his gaze, not even acknowledging to himself that he was shaking, he saw Seifer's strong, sun tanned hand nestling on top of his own pale one, providing a simple kind of comfort that required no words. For a brief moment, Squall thought he was going to collapse under the weight of his mother's revelation, but as he raised his eyes, their grey blue surface shadowed with helplessness and suffering, he saw nothing but a handsome face overcome with love and regret as Seifer crowded against him, pulling him into a hug.

"It's okay..." he could hear the other boy's words gushing into his ear, knowing that their sole intent was to blunt his mind-bending agony. "It's okay, Squall. It's okay."

If anything in Squall's life had ever been okay, it definitely hadn't been that particular moment in time when he was confronted with his own, biological father, whom he had hated more than the concept of hatred should have even allowed. Nonetheless, Squall was thankful for Seifer's almost naive, intimate attempt at reassurance, and for a long moment, he wished that he could never hear anything but the blond's strong, husky voice ever again.

If this was real, then he wanted nothing else – _needed _nothing else.

The world could have ended right then, and he wouldn't have cared.

"He's mine..." Laguna's cracking, awestruck voice barely managed to brush Squall's wrecked, unstable mind. 'Mine' was a term that had defined the brunette boy in many ways in the past, but never like this. "He... he really... Oh, my god..."

"Y-yes... You're... You're his father," the dark haired woman proclaimed between sharp, short gulps of air into Laguna's errant stuttering, her inflection filled with long years worth of remorse, "Laguna, Squall is your son. He's _our_ _son_."

Seifer could feel Squall tensing in his arms, digging his head deeper into the crook of his shoulder until his breathing flattened. He knew exactly what Squall was doing; the brunette was trying to push out reality, pretending that none of this was happening to him, mentally retreating to some safe haven in his mind that was far beyond the borders of what many would have considered healthy.

It was his own self-protective mechanism, one that the brunette had unconsciously forged for himself years ago, but Seifer knew that if he didn't want to lose Squall completely right then and there, he couldn't allow him to shut down. He had to keep Squall with him, no matter how much it hurt, and everything else suddenly faded in relevance.

"Squall," he murmured, breathing a hushed groan against the smaller boy's cheek as he gripped the nape of his neck. "I'm here. Everything's gonna be okay. Don't be afraid. It's alright. _I'm here._"

Squall could feel his own, stupid strength dissolving in Seifer's arms, surrendering to the fucked up nightmare that had haunted him for so many painful years. For so long, he had pretended that he didn't care, that none of this bothered him, that it made no difference to him whether he was any man's son, living or dead.

He could no longer even see how he had been able to lie to himself to such an absurd degree.

"Laguna, I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. Please... please forgive me. I'm so _sorry_."

Squall could hear his mother's voice, somewhere at the very periphery of his own awareness, but he didn't comprehend what she was saying – why she was _apologizing _to the man who had abandoned her and their unborn child eighteen years ago. There was a powerful flame that sparked inside of him at that grave, perverse injustice – the flame of his own spirit that had flickered many times throughout the past few months and years, but had never been fully extinct.

With a raw, mad growl rising in the back of his throat, Squall abruptly moved in Seifer's arms, semiconsciously shoving the blond aside to meet the eyes of his mother.

"_What_?" Squall hissed, his voice cold and harsh as his gaze became threatening. "What did you just say to him?"

He could see her wincing, shaking her head at him as if _he_ was the one who was misunderstanding the situation. "Squall—"

"Did you just _apologize_ to him?" the dark haired boy interrupted her with a snap, in a tone of voice he would only adopt when he fully meant to wound. There was a true, unmasked hatred to his expression that even Seifer – who had been on the receiving end of Squall's wrath on numerous occasions – had never seen on the brunette before.

"Squall, please, sweetheart you don't understand—"

"You're damn right I don't!" Squall shouted, slapping away Seifer's arm that the blond had cautiously tried to wrap around his chest. He could feel a frightening, all-consuming resentment gripping a hold of him, seizing whatever rational thought he might have harbored towards his mother, or Laguna, or the whole horrible entirety of their situation. His hands had clamped to fists by his sides, turning his knuckles white as snow.

"Squall, let her talk," Seifer attempted to reason with the dark haired boy, trying to diffuse the situation. "You guys should sit down and—"

"I don't wanna sit down!" Squall snapped back, so furious now that he was shaking.

His tear-stricken mother was still holding her hands to her mouth, whispering, "Squall, please, I—", but he interrupted her once more.

"Why the _fuck_ would you apologize to him? _Why_?" the brunette caterwauled, gesturing hysterically at his father, who was standing a few feet away from him, watching him with concern and pity in his eyes. "What the _hell _is the matter with you?"

"Squall, it's not what you—"

"He's the one who should be sorry! He's the one who left you! He's the one who wasn't there when you needed him! Don't you fucking _dare_ apologize to that piece of shit!"

She was sobbing again, shaking her head, pleading "It's not like that! Squall, your father didn't—"

"Don't call him that!" Squall yelled, his voice high and hitching with spite. "He's _not_ my father! He fucked everything up!"

"Squall," she whimpered once more, eliciting no pity from him. "Please, you—"

"... He's right."

Startled, everyone in the room froze to turn their attention towards Laguna, who was gazing back at Squall with profound sadness in his eyes. Seifer noticed that Raine was still shaking her head, seeming stuck in some bizarre, marionette-like state. The blond, too, couldn't understand why Raine would feel the need to apologize to her former lover, but contrary to Squall, he was willing to hear her explanation.

"Squall's right," Laguna repeated, his face deadpan as he let out a very long sigh, and he looked incredibly tired all of a sudden. "He's been seventeen years without a father, just because I wasn't there. He has a right to be angry."

"But it wasn't your fault!" Raine bristled, a newfound strength to her voice as she pushed her hair out of her face and attempted to wrestle down her own helplessness. "You didn't know. Laguna, you _didn't know_!"

"Still, I—"

"He didn't know?" Squall now cut in, remembering what Laguna had claimed all along – that he had never even had an inkling of his son's existence. Of course, initially Squall had believed none of it, if only because it had sounded too convenient. Now, he couldn't help but wonder.

"Is he telling the truth?" the brunette pressed, determined to find out for certain this time what was reality and what was just smoke and mirrors. Despite his conviction, however, there was a sudden sound of insecurity to his voice. "You really didn't tell him about me?"

"No," his mother admitted, looking upon her child with a silent plea for forgiveness which she didn't even feel she deserved. "I never told him about you. He had no idea. Squall... it wasn't his fault that you grew up without a father, nor was it yours. It was _mine_."

"But—"

"Laguna knew nothing of you, because I chose not to tell him that I was pregnant," Raine explained, her inflection filled with sorrow as she crushed her son's entire belief system. "I was young, and I thought it was for the best. Squall, it was _me_ who broke up our relationship! It was _my_ decision. I was the one who left your father. He had nothing to do with it. I never asked him what he wanted. I... never gave him any choice at all. _I'm_ the reason you grew up without your father, Squall. It's all my fault."

"But why?" Squall whispered, looking stunned and hurt beyond measure, a shallow numbness glowing in his eyes. His former anger seemed to have gotten lost among the agony that seemed to linger heavily in the air of the small kitchen. "Why didn't you tell him? Why? I don't... I don't understand."

"I was so scared that he would hate me," Raine whispered, and grief poured into her voice. "I loved him so much. I couldn't bear that possibility. I just couldn't."

"What? Hate you? But, Raine... what are you talking about? I could have never hated you, not in my entire life! Why would you even think that?" Laguna asked, sounding as shocked as Squall felt.

His former lover looked back at him hesitantly, her clear, cobalt blue eyes searching his perplexed face. Finally, after what felt like an eternity and then some, she let out a sigh.

"I... I'm not sure that I can explain it in any way that would make sense to you or Squall," she pressed weakly, "But... I will give it a try."

Almost completely out of instinct, Squall leaned closer towards Seifer, who was still quietly positioned to his right, a little ways off to the side, observing the situation. The blond, who noticed Squall's shift in posture and recognized the subtle gesture for precisely the plea for emotional support that it was, wordlessly moved his left arm across the kitchen counter to the small of Squall's back, where he curled his knuckles against the brunette's spine. Squall looked guarded to him as always, and understandably on edge, but the fact that the petulant dark haired teen had turned to him in this moment of vulnerability meant more than Seifer could have ever expressed in words.

Somewhere along the way, their chaotic relationship had transformed into something more important than his very own life.

'_I'd never leave him. I fuckin' love this guy with everything I have. And if you love someone, you stay by their side, no matter how fuckin' tough it gets and no matter how many times you wanna hit the ground and run. I understand that now. What the hell was Raine thinking back then?'_

The blond eighteen year old turned his focus to Squall's mother, who had approached the three of them silently. She was warily standing a couple of arm lengths away from Laguna, who was watching her with feverish concentration. Seifer noticed fine wrinkles in her face now that he had never spotted on her porcelain skin before, and he could tell that the weight of the world was resting on her frail shoulders. Despite her renegade strength, she looked breakable – just as breakable as Squall would now and then, when he allowed himself to let down his guard.

And once more, Seifer could feel his protective instincts rising.

"You must have had your reasons," the brawny blond spoke calmly into the stillness that was hovering between them, faking a smile when Raine looked back at him gratefully. "They know that, too. Just give it a shot."

It sounded so simple in theory, but Seifer could tell that this was one of the hardest things Raine Leonhart ever had to do. Rubbing her pale left hand with her glittering wedding band across her eyes, she finally managed to gather her resolution around herself and began to tell her own tale of yearlong heartbreak and guilt.

"Everything started... when I was a child. I think... I think I was eight years old when I first came to realize that my father didn't love my mother," the beautiful brunette woman spoke softly, her feminine voice barely audible despite the expectant silence. "It took me another few years to figure out that _I _was the reason for their lack of affection. Me... their only daughter. It didn't make sense to me for the longest time, and even today, it still doesn't. They loved me, but because of me, they couldn't love each other. Somehow, my existence had driven a wedge between them. I think... my outlook on love, children and marriage was forever skewed after I realized that."

Out of the corner of his eyes, Seifer noticed Squall frowning. Apparently, Raine had never shared any of these private demons with her son.

"Why would they have stopped loving each other because of you?" Squall asked right out, a hinted nuance of disapproval to the words. "That's crazy."

She gazed at him lovingly, her affection for Squall never even remotely a question. This was her son, and she would have killed to keep him safe, long before worrying about herself or anyone else.

"You're right, it is crazy... but their crazy relationship was my reality when I was growing up. It was everything I knew," she continued to narrate quietly, while leaning against Seifer's fridge with a hollowed sigh. "My father... he had always harbored a certain bitterness towards my mother, and towards me. I could tell, no matter how much he sometimes tried to hide it. My father was upset over _my _existence. It took me a while to figure out that he had been an aspiring musician while he first dated my mother. They had been so young back then, and so madly in love. However, when my mother got unexpectedly pregnant, reality quickly caught up with them. Scared of the future, my mother made him quit his penniless singing gig and get a 'real' job instead. Her motives were understandable, of course, and I would never blame her for wanting the best for us, but she ruined the free-spirited, carelessly handsome man that she fell in love with in the first place."

"Your mother was pregnant," Laguna chimed in, looking oddly grim. "Any man with an ounce of sense in him would want to provide for his family."

"And so he did," Raine nodded, but there was an unspoken sadness to the delicate gesture. "Despite his many faults, my father was a decent man, and he wasn't going to run out on his responsibilities. However... when he gave up his music career, he also gave up his own concept of happiness. He surrendered the most important piece of his life, and that void couldn't be filled by marriage or babies or a house with a white picket fence. It was never what he wanted."

"... So what did he do?" Squall inquired eventually, his inflection critical, but curious also. His mother had never spoken much about his grandparents, and he had never asked.

"He did nothing," the dark haired boy's mother continued, her melancholy pulling on every inch of her heart as she met her son's eyes. "He played his part, and my mother played hers. My father never physically left her, but his heart and his love left her the day I was born. She never managed to gain either back throughout the years, and eventually, she quit trying. I don't think he hated her, but he was indifferent to her, and that was worse than anything else. My mother was dying like a flower in his loveless presence, wilting a little bit every day, and I could hardly stand it."

Tears were flowing down Raine's face once more, and she quickly brushed them away with the heel of her hand. Even Squall seemed to be swallowing several times. Seifer could feel the younger boy's back flattening against his hand, and he noticed the shivers of a newly discovered pain echoing even through the cotton of the brunette's shirt.

It honestly made Seifer wonder how much more grief this family would be able to endure.

"I watched them fighting and sleeping in separate beds for so many, many years," Raine continued with a sniffle. "They might have been married, but for all it mattered, they were dead to each other. When Laguna and I started dating, I knew that I could never, ever live like that. I would have rather thrown myself off a bridge."

"But we would have never—" Laguna protested, but his former lover cut him short.

"You had your dreams, Laguna – so many of them, and I loved you for every single one of them. I would have never forgiven myself for destroying any of them – not even one. I knew that if you found out I was pregnant, you would have wanted to provide for us. You would have quit school, tossed away your aspirations for a journalist career and became exactly like my father – and I would not have been able to live with myself for it."

"That's not true," the man said sternly, shaking his head. "I would have _never_ felt like that towards you. Never. It's simply impossible."

"It was a risk I didn't want to take, because I loved you too much to accept even the remote possibility," the woman declared simply. "I knew I was strong. I knew I could make it on my own, and although it was never easy, it was always worth it."

She looked upon her son with pride, and for a very long moment, she had the distinct resemblance to a fearless lioness. Seifer could see now where Squall had inherited his steely resolve and almost foolish, unyielding strength, but he wondered too whether the price that him and his mother had paid hadn't been too great.

"Raine. I loved you more than my own _life_. You gave me more happiness than any career ever could have," Laguna declared, his voice dull with regret and sadness as his head bowed. Within minutes, the seemingly carefree journalist had aged by decades. "Our son is seventeen years old... and I missed out on all of it."

"I know, and I am so very sorry, believe me," Raine pleaded with desperate urgency, but then a sudden drizzling of hesitation meshed with her words. "I... I knew you were working in Esthar, so... I decided to move there a few years ago, when Squall was ten years old. I wanted you to meet your son, not because I wanted you to take responsibility of any kind, but because I thought... I thought that it was time. There was never a question in my mind whether you'd be a good father or not. I knew you would be a _great _father. I knew you'd want to do the right thing, always, and I figured that your career would now be able to handle the presence of a child in your life. I promise I never intended to keep your son from you, I just wanted to pick the right moment... the moment when I wouldn't be ruining all of your dreams, and when Squall would be old enough to understand. But then... I saw you near the Esthar Times building having coffee with a beautiful redheaded woman, and you two looked so close, and in a hurt, childish moment of pride, I didn't know what to think. I left, and I ended up meeting someone else, that very same day I meant to visit you... and I thought it must have been a sign."

"A _sign_?" Squall croaked, suddenly looking appalled. Seifer's head flung around to stare at him, alerted by the bizarre pitch in Squall's voice. "Wait a minute. Hold on. Kato was a _sign _to you?"

"Yes. It might sound like girlish superstition to you, and to be honest, I couldn't blame you for that," his mother went on to explain. "Trust me, I, too, have had my doubts over whether I shouldn't have brought you to see Laguna anyway, regardless of Kato or any woman's presence in the picture. However... I figured that Laguna had moved on, and Kato seemed ready to be a husband and a father, so I was willing to allow him to assume those roles in Laguna's stead. You were still so young, and I didn't want you to have any kind of reserve towards Kato, or any confusion over who to accept as a father figure."

"He was _never_ my father! Never! You hear me?" Squall lashed out, going ballistic with anger that he had no idea how to control. He gave her a scorching look as he abruptly pushed himself away from the counter, hissing a curse, and Seifer saw his features curling with a deeply ingrained kind of contempt. Startled, he watched how the brunette whipped past him and stomped away from them into the living room, stopping only to stand glued to one of the windows and stare persistently into the snow-fogged darkness. After exchanging unsure glances with a helpless looking Raine, Seifer too left the kitchen to cautiously approach his friend, who was standing with his quickly heaving back turned towards him, shaking all over.

"Squall," the blond whispered, tentatively placing one hand on top of the brunette's shoulder, half expecting it to be thrown off. To his surprise, Squall did nothing of that sort. Instead, Seifer could feel the lean framed brunette jerking beneath the touch, before suddenly burying his face in his right hand with a groan.

"Squall," Seifer repeated, more gently this time, regret swaying every letter of the boy's name as he tilted his head.

"All this time," Squall pressed through gritted teeth, his voice sounding oddly empty as it died in a frustrated gush of breath, "All this fucking time, because of _this_... All these years of... of... ugh. I didn't know, I had no idea, I... God... If she hadn't met him that day, none of this... none of this would have ever happened."

Raising a brow because he wasn't understanding his younger opposite's disconnected rambling, Seifer asked, "Squall, what are you talking about? What would have never happened?"

But Squall shook his head, either too upset or too unwilling to elaborate. Seifer watched him with concern, hardly even daring to move, lost on what to say.

The brunette boy's whole life had been a tragedy long before he had ever even taken his first breath. None of it seemed fair. For a moment, he felt a crushing sensation of hopelessness; he knew that there was no easy way out of this situation for Squall, and no simple fix, and for the first time in his life, Seifer felt completely at a loss.

Just what were they supposed to do now, faced with a past and a father that Raine had kept from her son for seventeen whole years? What was going to happen next?

And how much more would Squall be able to take before he would snap completely?

Not really knowing what else to do, Seifer slowly stepped around Squall's figure to confront him. He studied the brunette's features with meticulous apprehension, trying to read a boy who had spent his whole life keeping his own emotions a secret. He noticed that Squall's face and posture were tight, and his grey eyes had cut to the ground. Somewhere beneath the surface of Squall's suffocating coldness and self-absorbing anger, however, there was something that Seifer couldn't decipher. Squall's whole life had been blown away in the blink of an eye, but for some reason, Seifer could tell that Laguna and Raine weren't the true cause for the brunette's irrational hatred.

There was something else going on that went beyond Squall's obvious lack of a father figure and his disenchanted childhood.

"Squall," the tall blond started, not entirely sure what he wanted to ask. To his confusion, the brunette suddenly shook his head evasively and tilted his face towards the window once more, staring persistently into the darkness.

Before Seifer had a chance to find out what else was wrecking his friend, Laguna and Raine were suddenly making their way into the living-room with carefully considered steps. They arranged themselves somewhere near Squall's back, leaving the brunette effectively cornered between themselves and Seifer.

It was then that the blond could hear Squall letting out a harsh, gritty sigh.

"What the hell do you want from me?"

The dark haired teen had turned slightly to direct that brusque, hostile question at his father, Laguna. Arms crossed defensively before his chest, he seemed to challenge the man from Esthar to abandon him once more.

Laguna, however, was planning on doing nothing of that sort.

"I don't really think that's the question here," the reporter replied in a calm, unimpressed tone of voice that was dominated by infinite patience. "I think the question is, what do _you _want from _me_? I know there is no way I could ever make up for missing the past seventeen years of your childhood, and I don't expect you to forgive me for not being there... but I _want_ to be a part of your life, and I hope you'll give me a chance to show you that I care."

"Care?" Squall repeated, jerking his head in an arrogant, dismissive sort of way. "Why the hell would you give half a _shit_ about me? You don't even know me!"

Seifer instantly noticed the change for the worse in Squall's face – his quick, instinctive tendency to shoot down anyone who might possibly hurt him somewhere down the road. Love, to Squall, was a very rare, brutally guarded feeling that resided deep in the center of his chest. His inability to trust any human being made it difficult for him to feel anything but resentment towards others. Anger, on the other hand, would quickly spread through every fiber of his body, threatening to erupt in a violent outburst at any given moment. Seifer had come to understand this, and he knew to tread with caution around Squall because it was so ridiculously easy to strike a nerve, but he wasn't so sure whether Laguna was aware of this, too.

To his surprise, Laguna ignored Squall's burning look of loathing and instead regarded the abrasive boy with a gentle smile. "Squall, I feel privileged to even be here right now. Trust me, I completely understand your anger towards me, but overall, the situation is a bit different for me. I just found out that I have a son, and you probably have no idea what that means to me. I feel nothing for you but awe and affection, Squall. I know you don't reciprocate those feelings right now, and I don't expect you to, but it doesn't change anything for me. I couldn't be any happier over the fact that I'm your father. It's the most incredible feeling in the world."

Seifer could always tell when Squall was genuinely confused, because the boy would become utterly silent, robbed of his usual, pissed off comebacks. He watched his brunette friend with nearly childish interest, noting the sharp gleam of suspicion in his narrowed smoke colored eyes, but he could tell that Laguna's words had managed to touch Squall somehow.

"Look, Squall... I cannot undo the damage I caused through my absence, and I can't undo what happened to you throughout the years I wasn't there for you," Laguna continued, swiping Squall's wrist a curt, but poignant look that didn't escape Seifer's attention. "But I really, really hope you'll give me a chance. I want you to be happy, no matter what it takes and no matter how long or how hard I have to try. I think that's what everyone here really wants... is for you to be happy."

As much as the man's words bothered Squall on a superficial level, it also didn't make them any less true, and a small part of the boy that had remained unaffected by the trauma of his past understood that, too. Everyone in the room loved the reclusive brunette boy in their very own way, for reasons that many would probably never understand. Of course, that didn't make the situation any less complex. It was much easier for Squall to hate than to show affection, because after all, what was there to lose when all you felt towards someone was spite?

'_... Nothing at all.'_

Yet, as upset and confused as he was, he still couldn't bring himself to hate Laguna, and that concept probably frightened him more than anything else. Squall wasn't scared of being alone, he never had been – he was scared of being abandoned, and those were two very different things.

Groaning under the devastating gravity of it all, the brunette pressed his lips together and dropped his gaze to the floor, shutting his eyes as tightly as he could. He rubbed the bridge of his nose with his fingers, trying to ease the throbbing migraine raging between his temples.

He had never felt so physically and emotionally exhausted before.

Raine, who seemed to recognize the dramatic extent of Squall's fatigue, immediately stepped up to her son and cupped his jaw with her pale, slender hands, knowing full well he didn't have the heart to push her away, regardless of how angry he might have been. She looked upon him lovingly until he finally lifted his eyes up to meet hers.

"Squall," she murmured tenderly, cambering her lips into a smile, "Listen to me. _I love you_. You are my life. I never, not once, not even for a single second, regretted giving birth to you. You need to understand that, okay? I am so proud to be your mother, and I wish I could take away the pain I caused you through my decisions. Please know that I never meant to hurt you. That was _never _my intention. I always just wanted the best for you, no matter what sacrifices it took from me."

With an uncomfortable twist to his face, Squall cut his gaze to the side and murmured "... I know."

She wasn't so sure she believed him, and while caressing his cheeks with her thumbs, she shook her head and sighed.

"I wish I could have spared you all of this," she whispered, the words colored with sincerest regret. "I wish there would have been an easier way, and perhaps there was, and I simply failed to see it. I know I don't have the right to ask anything from you, least of all your forgiveness for keeping your father from you, but I hope and pray that you will give him a chance to show you what a wonderful man he is."

Scowling, Squall glanced past his mother's face at the man who was supposed to be his biological father, but who meant nothing to him. Granted, yes, he didn't _hate _the journalist from Esthar, but that didn't mean that he harbored any kind of positive sentiments towards the man, either. Perhaps he was being unfair, since the choice of raising him or not had never been Laguna's to make, but right now, a very powerful, selfish part of Squall _wanted_ to be unfair. He owed that man nothing. His life had been shattered, and it would require time and a lot of patience from the people around him to pick up the pieces and put them back in some sort of order. Squall didn't believe that a man he had known for less than 24 hours would be up for that kind of challenge.

'_I don't even know if __**I **__am...'_

Honestly, he didn't know where to go from here. He tried to convince himself that he wanted to detest Laguna more than he wanted to love him, but perhaps that wasn't true, either.

Right now, nothing made sense anymore.

"Squall, listen... I want you to take tomorrow off school," his mother suddenly announced, causing Squall to shoot her a glimpse of confusion.

"What?" he asked, drawing his eyebrows together. "Why?"

"Because this is a lot to deal with," Raine explained, studying him sadly. "It's a lot more than most kids your age could handle."

"I'm fine," Squall growled his typical, generic response to anyone who seemed concerned over his well-being. He tried to turn his head away, but she wouldn't let him.

After all, she was still his mother, and while Squall might have been capable and willing to run away from a lot of things, he would never run away from her.

"You're not fine," she declared stoically, "And I know that it's my fault. It's _always_ been my fault. It breaks my heart to watch you suffering like this, sweetheart, believe me. I know it will take time for you to come to terms with what happened today, and it won't be accomplished in a day, or a month, or maybe even a year, but I want to make it as easy for you as I can. If there's anything I can do to make this less painful for you, please, tell me. Please."

Squall paused for a moment, dissolving into complete unresponsiveness as his thoughts gravitated into a different kind of territory. Staring down at his own hands which he held clutched by his sides, he couldn't help but wonder one thing.

"... What are you going to do about Kato?"

Looking a bit taken aback, the dark haired woman tilted her head and looked uncertainly between her son and her high school lover. It had always been like Squall to think two steps ahead and concern himself with the entirety of a problem, but quite honestly, she didn't know what to tell him.

Right now, Kato seemed like the least of anyone's problems.

"Well," she started, carefully considering how she was going to construct her answer. "I think that... Laguna and I have a lot to talk about. It doesn't change the fact that Kato is still my husband, of course, but... in the end, this isn't his decision. This is between you and Laguna, Squall. Seven years ago, Kato's interests might have mattered, but not today. Today, this is entirely up to you."

After contemplating her words for a minute, Squall placidly nodded his head. He didn't quite know what he had expected, nor if he actually _liked_ his mother's response, but he understood what she was saying. Of course, Squall didn't exactly consider it the wisest choice to inform Kato of his newfound father figure, but he wasn't about to tell him, either. Whether Raine would tell her husband or not was beyond his control, anyway, and right now, he didn't see the point in thinking about it.

At this very moment, he had too much to deal with to worry himself sick over Kato's likely violent backlash. It would happen when Kato wanted it to, whether Laguna was in the picture or not. Nobody would be able to protect Squall from the man's absurd perversity.

In that aspect, nothing had changed at all.

'_It makes no difference. It's not going to stop until __**I **__put an end to it. I always knew that.'_

"Hey," Seifer abruptly penetrated the stiff silence that filled his living-room, "Is it okay for him to spend the night?"

The blond motioned lightly at Squall, who jerked his head around and gave him a blank stare. Of course, Seifer figured that his friend had to be annoyed because his opinion was being passed over just like that, but he also assumed that Squall would much rather sleep at his place instead of returning to the Kearan residence after everything that had happened tonight.

"Of course," Raine agreed, sounding somewhat relieved. "I think that's a good idea."

"But... I don't have any clothes here," Squall argued, as if to put up a token amount of resistance.

"We can pick 'em up tomorrow," Seifer suggested, giving the brunette as genuine of a smile as he could muster. Of course, if Squall was going to skip out of school, he was planning on doing the exact same thing. He'd never pass up an opportunity to spend an entire day's worth with the brunette. Besides, he figured that the younger boy could use some companionship right now, even if he'd never admit it.

His persistence earned Seifer another pissed off glare from his classmate, but in the end, Squall finally heaved his shoulders in a shrug and rasped, "Whatever."

Raine chuckled tenderly, and it was the closest thing to a laugh that Seifer had heard from her since she had entered his apartment. With a more peaceful expression, she kissed her son on the nose and hugged him very gently, before finally letting go.

"I think Laguna and I should get going," she announced, motioning her former lover towards the front door. "You guys need some sleep."

"Alright," Seifer agreed, never one to object to being alone with Squall.

"Oh, wait. Seifer, do you have a mop so I can clean up the mess I made with my coffee?" Raine asked, looking somewhat embarrassed. Seifer, however, only shook his head.

"Nah, don't worry about it, I'll get it," he reassured her. "Get some rest."

"Okay. Thank you, Seifer... for everything," she murmured, before looking from her son to Laguna and back. Squall was still standing by the window, watching them tensely from a distance that felt like a million miles.

"Squall," Laguna immediately cut in, as if catching on to some kind of clue. "Seifer has my cell phone number, and I will give it to your mother as well. Please, give me a call when you feel up to it. I know this is overwhelming for you, but I'd like to see you again before I go back to Esthar this weekend, if you let me. I really... want to get to know you. However, if you feel like it's too much for you right now, I understand. I don't wanna force you. I will talk to you and see you as much as you will let me. You boys are welcome at my place in Esthar any time. I have a beach house as well. You might enjoy spending a few days there, too. Just let me know when you'd like to come visit, and I will send you guys the tickets."

"Thank you," Seifer voiced his gratitude, knowing full well that Squall would not. The brunette was in a very vulnerable, defensive state right now, and he'd sooner punch his father than give him a hug. However, Seifer didn't think that all hope for a reconciliation was lost just yet, and that was a very comforting thought.

"We're going to go now," Laguna said, very hesitantly placing one hand upon Raine's shoulder. The woman flinched momentarily, but then she looked up at Laguna in a way that wasn't so unlike the way Squall had looked at Seifer before, in those rare moments when he'd been completely honest with his own feelings and needs.

No... there was hope yet. For all of them.

Squall watched from his position by the window how Seifer guided his parents out of his apartment, leaving behind a feeling of emptiness that the brunette couldn't explain. He was suddenly tired of standing, tired of pretending that he was okay, tired of playing his part in this fucked up game called life.

'_I really am a pathetic piece of shit.'_

Groaning, Squall slid along the wall to the floor, collapsing against the hard surface. He pitched his head into his neck, staring at the ceiling as if there was some kind of divine answer written upon it.

What he found, however, was Seifer's face.

The blond stood before him, his chin slightly tilted, the corners of his lips curved into a small smile as he fully appreciated the startled look in Squall's eyes.

"You look exhausted," Seifer stated plainly, saving the mockery that he normally liked to dole out. "Do you wanna go to bed?"

Squall shook his head in response, focusing on his own hands which he had placed upon his propped up knees. He fanned out his fingers, studying them with faked interest. "No," he said, not caring anymore how ludicrous he might have looked or sounded. "I just... wanna sit here."

"Okay."

Irritated, Squall followed Seifer's feet with his eyes as they walked away from him. He almost felt a pang of disappointment, until the lights in the kitchen and living-room suddenly went out and Seifer approached his crouching figure once more in the darkness, carrying some kind of blanket. Wordlessly, the blond sat down next to him on the floor against the wall, hovering beneath the snowed up window, draping the soft, dark blue microfiber cover over both of their bodies. Squall felt an undeniable rush of heat and affection as Seifer leaned against him, but before he could have said anything at all, Seifer had wrapped his right arm around the nape of his neck and pulled their faces together. As he pressed his parted lips against Squall's, both of them inhaling the same breaths through their open mouths, he could finally taste the tears that Squall had been holding back until now, but he didn't ask and he didn't say a single word.

This wasn't the time for stupid questions or pretty speeches. This was the time to give in and accept the fact that life sucked sometimes.

This was the time neither of them would ever forget.


	33. Northern Lights

-:-  
**Chapter 33  
****Northern Lights**

"_I want you to do nothing at all."_

-:-

This might hurt  
It's not safe  
But I know that I've gotta make a change  
I don't care  
If I break  
At least I'll be feeling something  
Cause just okay  
Is not enough  
Help me fight through the nothingness of life.

"_The Motions" – Matthew West_

-:-

He awoke to the smell of something pleasant, feeling comfortably numb and almost a little bit too cold. For a moment, the abstract concepts of time and place and existence completely eluded him. He didn't know where he was, much less could have guessed the time of day. For all he was concerned, it didn't even matter. Nothing seemed to matter very much right now, and he was so used to worrying about everything that he actually enjoyed this feeling of complete carelessness for once. Stretching his arms and legs while arching his back, he laid like that for a while, completely oblivious to the world, before boredom finally caught up with him and he slowly forced his eyelids to open.

The room around him was filled with streaks of crisp white light that had quietly stolen their way through haphazardly drawn blinds. At first, his environment meant nothing to him. He was surrounded by random, strange pieces of furniture; a love seat, an arm chair, a coffee table, a flat screen television. The brunette teenager paused for a second, blinking at least once or twice in a manner of confusion as he tried to make heads and tails of his own disarrayed thoughts, but when he noticed the beautiful Malamute dog snoring on the floor near his feet, it all finally made sense.

'_This is Seifer's place...'_

Squall Leonhart realized now that he was curled up on a hard, granite colored couch in his classmate's living room, covered by a thick, dark blue microfiber blanket. His face was pressed partly into a decorative pillow, but he could still perceive the weighty scent of cocoa and fresh bread hanging in the air like some kind of alluring, sensual wake-up call. Frowning slightly, he pushed himself into a sitting position. He noticed that his hands were sore, but the reason why eluded him at this point. He heard strange noises coming from the kitchen, but he couldn't see anyone from his unfavorable position on the couch.

"... Seifer?"

His voice was thick and rasp from sleep, but he managed to call out just loud enough to cause the sounds in the kitchen to cease. Moments later, a familiar blond in black sweat pants and a white, hooded sweatshirt came trotting into the living room, regarding his guest who was sprawled out on his couch with a fond grin.

"Hey there, sleeping beauty."

Squall watched him approaching with curiosity, ignoring the playful greeting for the minute being. Seifer was barefooted, his blond hair damp and tousled in a casual, yet attention-grabbing kind of way. The tall, brawny eighteen year old was carrying a coffee mug in each hand, and he placed both of them on the table in front of Squall, before taking a casual seat on the armrest of the sofa.

"Hey..." Squall returned Seifer's greeting unsurely, while swiping the blond an upwards glance. "What time is it?"

The randomness of his question caused Seifer to chuckle.

"Seriously?" the blond teased. "Does it matter?"

Squall scowled at him for being such an annoying brat, but then he refocused his train of thought and tried to remember how he had ended up on Seifer's couch in the first place. With an uncomfortable pinch in the pit of his stomach, he recalled falling asleep on Seifer's floor the night before, after having a very long and very emotional conversation with his mother and his newly discovered father, Laguna Loire.

All in all, it had been an evening he would have actually rather forgotten.

Of course, Seifer didn't miss the distant, shadowed look to Squall's expression and the quiet hostility in his eyes, which always seemed to follow an upsurge of dark memories. Squall was fighting them, as usual, but Seifer could tell that the remembrances of the previous night were still too fresh in the younger teen's mind.

"It's Tuesday," Seifer informed the boy, while watching him intently. "9:30am, if you really wanna know."

"Oh," Squall deadpanned in response, before a sense of panic settled in and showed clearly on his pale face. "Wait a minute, it's a school day!"

"Yeah, and your mom told you to stay home, remember?" the blond reminded him stoically. "Relax. I already talked to her this morning. She said she called the school and told them you and I weren't coming in today. It's all taken care of."

"Oh. Right..." Squall drawled in an oddly defeated voice, looking thoughtful as his gaze drifted off. Seifer studied him with unconcealed interest, before suddenly reaching out and ruffling Squall's hair the way he always would when he was trying to get a rise out of the brunette. Looking annoyed, Squall mumbled a few curses under his breath and quickly grabbed Seifer's forearm to yank it aside.

"Knock it off, asshole!" he ordered, causing the blond to slide off the armrest and settle down next to him instead. Squall narrowed his grey blue eyes at him in disapproval, but his heated glare elicited little but impish laughter from his companion.

"Honestly, princess, it's too early to look that fuckin' grumpy," Seifer snorted, before picking up one of the mugs from the coffee table and shoving it in Squall's unsuspecting hands. "Here. Drink up."

"What–"

"It's hot chocolate," the blond cut him off, looking pleased with himself. "With marshmallows, no less, thank you."

Squall looked down when he took the warm stoneware cup into his hands, inspecting it with an air of bewilderment. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd had hot chocolate, let alone with marshmallows. It wasn't exactly like Squall to treat himself like that. However, as much as the dark haired boy didn't care for sweet stuff in general, he had to admit that he'd still always had a childlike appreciation for the delicious, oddly soothing beverage.

"Why hot chocolate?" he asked, sounding perplexed as his gaze found Seifer's once more. "That's random. What the hell made you think of that?"

"... Ah. I thought you'd never ask. Come on."

The blond grabbed the second mug, before carefully pulling Squall to his feet by his upper arm and guiding him towards one of the windows. The brunette complied with the physical order, yet he looked irritated, at least until Seifer drew up the blinds and he finally understood what the blond had been eager to show him all along.

The world beyond Seifer's apartment had been covered with a smooth, thick sheet of pure white snow, which had formed magnificent crystals at the frosted edges of the paneled window glass. It was still snowing now, and the sky was a beautifully clear silver-blue color. Holding onto the warm mug he was cradling with his fingers, Squall had to admit that although he harbored a deeply seated dislike for snow, he was still quite fascinated by the brilliant, almost blinding sight laid out in front of him. There was a perfect stillness in the air that caused his chest to ache, and although he wasn't quite sure if that feeling was good or bad, he appreciated it all the same.

Meanwhile, Seifer had stopped closely behind Squall, and he leaned down to press a kiss on the back of his head, using the opportunity to inhale that familiar, exquisite scent of the brunette's mussed up hair.

"That's a lot of snow," Squall murmured, and Seifer didn't miss the strained undertone to his voice as his gaze flitted to the side, away from the window.

"Yeah, it is," he agreed quietly, and he nudged Squall's ear with his nose affectionately, almost as if he was trying to apologize. Then, his face suddenly lit up. "So, tell me... are you ready for a little adventure, or what?"

"Huh?" Squall grunted, half turning around. He found Seifer grinning at him, his green eyes gleaming with excitement that made no sense to the brunette. "What are you talking about?"

"Drink your hot chocolate and go eat some buttermilk biscuits," Seifer replied, apparently determined to fatten Squall up like a Thanksgiving turkey. "They're in the kitchen. Then you're gonna find out."

The brunette stared back at him suspiciously, eyes narrowed, trying to read the blond's face in vain.

"I really don't think I like your idea of surprises," Squall admitted, his voice filled with mistrust and just a pinch of sarcasm.

"Well, yeah, I can't blame you, I guess," Seifer muttered, scratching the back of his head in embarrassment. "This one is gonna be a lot more pleasant than the one from last night, though. I promise."

Grimacing, Squall replied, "Yeah, for your sake I sure as hell hope so."

"I'm sorry," Seifer apologized, looking contrite.

After hesitating for a few seconds, as if to gauge whether the blond's remorse was sincere, Squall finally blew out a reluctant breath and sighed, "Whatever. It wasn't your fault. I guess... in the end, it was something I needed to know."

His head streaked to the side and he stepped away from the window, saying nothing further as his expression became closed. He proceeded to walk into the kitchen, not because he was particularly hungry or docile, but because Seifer's presence had suddenly become overwhelming. While he no longer felt that imposing kind of discomfort he used to experience when Seifer would be near him, he wasn't exactly used to being smothered all the time, either. Of course, none of that was really Seifer's fault; in the end, the blond had done nothing wrong. Quite truthfully, Squall actually enjoyed being showed physical affection by the older teen, but he wasn't accustomed to letting it happen while his mind was heavy and creeping with memories. Ever since he'd been a child, Squall had always had a habit of brooding on things and becoming way too preoccupied with seemingly insignificant details. The only means of stopping the constant noise within the walls of his own head he'd ever come up with was to take a razorblade to his wrist.

And even Squall was fully aware that said method of coping with his emotional burden was painful and psychotic at best.

'_I guess he's right. I really need to relax.'_

As his gaze roamed the kitchen, Squall found a baking sheet with a dozen fresh, wonderfully warm buttermilk biscuits. Interested, the brunette picked one of them up and leaned against the counter, picking at it here and there while he started to sip his hot chocolate.

"You like?" Seifer asked with a hopeful smile as he entered the kitchen as well, stopping in his tracks straight across from the brunette with a proud grin. "Made them all by myself."

"Yeah, I do," Squall nodded placidly as he chewed with a thoughtful expression. "... Not bad for being the canned kind, actually."

The blond let out a bark of good-natured laughter, and he cocked his head towards the brunette. "Ah. You figured it out, huh?"

With a wry, knowing smirk, Squall pointed at the empty biscuit can wrapper sitting abandoned at the other end of the counter. His attentive eyes were bright and blue and glittering with humor. It was a carefree look that Seifer thoroughly loved seeing on the brunette.

"Hey, I bought them and put them in the oven all by myself, that counts as cooking, I'd say," Seifer defended himself, while crossing his arms at the nape of his neck.

"Yeah, you hang on real tight to that thought," Squall quipped sarcastically, before getting serious once more and dropping his hand that was holding the biscuit down to his side. "Hey. When did you get up, anyway?"

"Oh. About an hour and a half ago, I guess. We slept on the floor, ya know, so I picked you up and put you on the couch after I woke up. You were dead to the world, man, you didn't even budge!" Seifer teased, particularly delighted when he saw the murderous glint in Squall's blue eyes. "Then I went to the store and took a shower when I came back. You were still comatose by the time I was done making breakfast. I was about to start drawing on your face with my sharpie pen."

"Asshole," Squall grunted, looking offended. Honestly, it wasn't like the brunette to not wake up when someone was moving him in his sleep. He really had to have been out cold like Seifer had claimed, and he found that realization a little bit unsettling.

'_I don't get it. Was I really that tired? Even so, I shouldn't have been sleeping that hard. It's not exactly safe. Although... I guess nothing's really going to happen to me while I'm here. At least he's never tried anything while I was asleep. If he gets anywhere near me with a permanent marker though, I'll fucking gut him.'_

Shifting in his position by the kitchen counter, Squall finally gave Seifer a challenging stare and said, "Whatever. So what's this 'adventure' you were talking about, anyway?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?" Seifer cackled, true to his typical mischievous self as he inhaled a gulp of cocoa.

"That's exactly the reason why I _asked_, idiot," Squall answered dryly.

"I'm aware of that, cupcake," the blond said calmly, clearly contemplating on whether to toy with the brunette some more. He eventually came to the conclusion that Squall wasn't going to let him off the hook this time, and it was a little too early in the day to piss the short-tempered brunette boy off. "Well... okay, fine, I'll tell you this much: I was looking for things for us to do in the area, and I found this awesome place I wanna take you. It's an hour or so from here, but it'll be worth the drive."

"What kinda place?" Squall asked, admittedly surprised that Seifer wanted to take another road trip. "Where is it?"

"I can't tell you that," the eighteen year old said, and he looked upon his friend with an apologetic smile. "You're just gonna have to get in the car with me and trust me."

Squall was gazing at him for a long time, smoke blue eyes hard as diamonds, yet filled with bit of harshly covered up insecurity. The concept of trusting anyone was still quite foreign to him, but he was doing a lot better than he had been. Of course, he had to give Seifer all the credit for making him comfortable enough to believe in another human being's good intentions again. So far, the blond had done a spectacular job at treating him like something precious and breakable and going out of his way to be kind and patient. The few times that Seifer had slipped up, Squall actually took the blame for, anyway. Most importantly, Seifer was still there, when many others would have already hightailed it out of the fucked up piece of insanity that was Squall's life. Seifer had apparently made it his personal mission to drag Squall out of his comfort zone, and for once, the brunette had decided that he would let him, no matter how much the thought unsettled him right now.

'_I can't keep running away all the time. Things are... starting to catch up with me. I realized that last night. I guess... it's time I face this shit head on.'_

Besides... when everything was said and done, some of the times he'd spent with the ornery blond had quite honestly been the best of his life.

"Alright," he finally nodded his head with restrained determination. "Fine. Let's do it."

"Really?" Seifer shot back, looking perplexed. This had been almost too easy.

"Yeah, but if you keep being annoying about it, I'll change my mind," Squall snapped, the bite in his voice blatantly belied by the subtle glow of peacefulness in his eyes.

Across from him, Seifer only smiled.

* * *

"What the hell is this place?"

Craning his neck, Squall looked outside the passenger window of Seifer's pickup truck. The brunette was freshly showered, dressed in dark grey khaki pants, a long sleeved cream colored t-shirt, a black and white thermal fleece jacket and hiking boots that they had picked up from his parents' place prior to their trip. Seifer had ordered him to dress appropriately for the outdoors, and Squall had nagged him the whole drive about their unknown destination. Now, as the blond was pulling the truck into a rugged looking field, which was covered with snow and patches of ice, Squall was no closer to figuring out where they were. He realized that they were somewhere east of Deling City, near the ocean, but his knowledge ended about right there.

"Ever heard of the Tomb of the Unknown King?"

Squall gave his friend a look of uncertainty, before staring at the distant stone ruins that crested a nearby hill and rose into the pale blue sky before them. He caught a glimpse of cracked pillars and half-destroyed walls, as well as a few ancient trees and a lake that surrounded the mysterious place which Seifer had just referred to as "The Tomb of the Unknown King."

"No, I've never heard of it," Squall admitted, still surveying the ancient looking structures from afar with a small sneer. "What the hell is it supposed to be?"

"Well, supposedly the last emperor of Dollet lies buried here somewhere in those ruins," Seifer elaborated as he turned off the engine of his truck. He shrugged into his own red fleece jacket, which had been resting on the back seat.

"The last emperor of Dollet?" Squall asked skeptically, furrowing his brows. He'd never been much of a history buff or anything, but he figured this was something he would have normally known, and it bothered him that he didn't. "Who's that?"

"I don't really know, to be honest with ya," his blond companion shrugged, while putting on a pair of gloves. "The tomb is nameless, because people used to think that calling a dead king by his name brings bad luck. That's what I read online, anyway. Supposedly there's monsters creeping inside and stuff, too. Although personally, I think that sounds like a load of horseshit. Anyway, I guess we'll just have to figure it out for ourselves. So, how about it, let's go take a look, shall we?"

Squall didn't look convinced as he watched Seifer getting out of the vehicle. He wasn't entirely sure why Seifer had wanted to go see some old ruins, but he wasn't about to question the blond's intentions, either. If nothing else, he figured he might learn something new, and he'd always been a bit eager to further his knowledge on, well, pretty much anything. Obviously, his grasp on Galbadia's history was lacking some critical bits and pieces. Sighing, he therefore zipped up his jacket, put on his own set of black gloves and followed his older friend's example by jumping out of the truck.

His heavy boots made no sound as they hit the snow covered plains of Galbadia. Nature had frozen everything around them into its own version of a snow globe. Their breath hung in the air as crystallized fog, but despite the stinging cold, it was sunny and bright outside. Squall couldn't see any other cars or visitors around. From the looks of it, the two of them were completely alone. He watched Seifer stuffing a flashlight and his cellphone into his pocket, and his watchful gaze fell upon the blond with a certain semi-conscious fondness. As annoying as Seifer could be at times, Squall appreciated the fact that the blond liked to take him places and show him new things. It was pleasantly distracting from his daily rut, and it made him feel strangely alive.

"You ready, cupcake?"

Squall frowned disapprovingly at the pet name, but he nodded all the same. Together, the two of them ascended the winding, tree lined path towards the ruins, which looked a lot more impressive up close than they had at first glance. The old, weathered limestone walls were covered by moss and dark ivy, surrounded by bare trees and shrubs, and the curious brunette wondered how many hundred years had passed since the place had been erected. He studied the lake surrounding the tomb with interest, finding something odd about it.

"Why isn't the lake frozen?" Squall asked, pointing at the gently moving waters with one gloved hand. "It should be."

"They say this place is magical somehow," Seifer explained in an airy, girlish tone, before letting out a rough chuckle. "Nah, seriously, I guess there's an entire waterworks system hidden in those ruins, or something like that. That might be what's keeping the water from freezing, but honestly, I really don't have a clue."

Squall screwed up his face, which looked absurdly attractive to his friend's watchful eyes.

"Weird," the brunette huffed simply, before shoving his hands into his pockets and moving on.

As they slowly made their way past some broken pillars and knocked down dividers towards the tomb's entry, Squall's gaze instinctively drifted to the left, and he paused in his determined stride. The icy wind cut into his jacket and his hair, and he brushed the wayward tresses aside unconsciously as he stared towards a small, shallow clearing past a weathered stone arch, nestled between trees and crumbling stone pillars. He noticed several oddly shaped rocks sticking out from the ground, tipped with piles of snow. Narrowing his eyes as the cold stung his face, Squall curiously turned to walk towards the clearing, when he suddenly felt Seifer grabbing his forearm and pulling him back.

"What the…?"

Squall threw an irritated glance across his shoulder, but he was taken aback by the panicked expression he noticed on Seifer's face when the blond yanked him even closer.

"Seifer…? What…?"

The brunette reeled around towards his friend, frowning at the petrified, hallowed look in Seifer's eyes. The blond appeared to have paled a few shades, and his features were tight, as if pounded into glass.

"Squall."

There was a strange grit to Seifer's voice when he uttered his friend's name, making the brunette suddenly feel uneasy. Looking around, wondering if he'd been missing something significant or even dangerous, Squall asked with a quick note of concern, "What? What is it?"

Breathing in sharply through his nose, Seifer looked past Squall towards the clearing, before shaking his head and swallowing a couple of times.

"Seifer," Squall said sternly, looking the blond straight in the eye, "What the hell is the matter?"

Seifer licked his lips once or twice, before making a brief coughing noise to clear his throat and muttering reluctantly, "… It… uh… It's a graveyard."

Stumped, Squall looked back and forth between the clearing and Seifer's grim face, obviously not understanding. For a few seconds, he wondered whether Seifer was trying to be funny or if he had simply checked out his brain sometime before their trip, until some memory lost within his mind finally clicked into place.

_::"I'm scared of graveyards, because they contain nothing but ghosts of the past and depressing memories that are meant to drag you down with them."::_

For a moment, Squall was brought back to that bitter argument him and Seifer had had a few weeks ago, back on the spiral staircase of his home, when Seifer had called him a liar and yelled at him for not admitting to what he was afraid of. That day, Seifer had revealed to Squall his own fears and nightmares, and until now, the brunette had completely forgotten that his brawny blond friend was scared of death and tombstones.

'_But… this doesn't make any sense.'_

"Seifer," the dark haired boy murmured, carefully reaching out to touch the blond's right hand, which was still clutching his own left forearm in a vice-like grip. "Hey… look, I get it. I know you don't like graveyards, okay, but… technically, this whole _place _is a graveyard. It's called 'The Tomb of the Unknown King', remember?"

"I know," Seifer pressed, looking uncomfortable as he cut his eyes to the ground, "I know."

"Then why did you bring me here?" Squall asked, honestly seeming dumbfounded. "It's a tomb. You _knew_ that."

"Well… yeah, I did, but…" Seifer started with a crack to his voice, realizing that he no longer sounded like his normal, overconfident self. He continued licking the corner of his bottom lip in a gesture of nervousness. "I read that you can see these amazing northern lights out here when it gets dark… it sort of reminded me of Cosmo Canyon, you know, and I really wanted to see it with you. I figured after what happened out at the lake last time you might not want to go back there right now, so I wanted to find someplace else to go that was nice."

The blond teenager paused, momentarily distracted by the cutely stunned look on his friend's face, before he swiftly cleared his throat and continued.

"But… most importantly, I… well… what I'm trying to say is that… you know… Uhm…" Seifer stammered, feeling like a class retard. Somehow, he'd never had this much trouble getting out his words. "Look… I… I realize that over the past few weeks, I've forced you to confront a lot of your fears, mostly against your will. It's been traumatizing for you. I know that you didn't wanna do any of it, but for some reason, you did it anyway. I know it wasn't easy for you. I know it hurt, and I know it was hard. You've been so fuckin' strong through all of it, and you've put up with so much of my shit. I don't get how you do it. I've said and done terrible things to you. This whole time, I've felt like I don't even deserve you. You've been the only one who's been stepping out of his comfort zone, and I've just been sitting here watching you do it. It's not fair to you. So I… I figured… well, I figured it was time I get a taste of what you're going through and face some fears of my own."

Squall could feel the sharp winter wind stinging his face as he stood there, staring at Seifer while something deeply frozen inside of him slowly seemed to dissolve. He was overcome by an entirely new kind of affection for the blond, whom he suddenly saw in a different light than before. He was thunderstruck by the fact that Seifer would deliberately put himself through emotional torment only to understand him and make him feel better. It was absurd and childish in a way, and also entirely unnecessary, and yet it was a gesture that was heartwarming, one-of-a-kind, and both simple and grandiose at the very same time. Perhaps that didn't make any sense at all, but for now, it really didn't matter.

Because this was the first time Squall truly fell in love with the blond.

He let out a sigh that was breathless and almost silent amidst the sharp howl of the cold breeze that cut across the land. As he stood there, his eyes focused on nothing but Seifer, he tried to make sense of the strange new emotions stirring within him. The boy before him had freely subjected himself to the suffering and the shadows within his heart, just for him, and Squall could feel some of the demons lurking within his own soul yielding to that gesture. Nobody aside from his mother had ever suffered for him like that or made any kind of selfless sacrifice completely for his sake alone. Seifer had let down his guard in hopes that Squall would do the same, and his actions had not been in vain.

As something profound within him stirred, Squall did something that would essentially alter his world and his relationship with Seifer forever – something he had never done before. Closing his eyes, he took one step towards Seifer and slowly wrapped his right arm around the blond's brawny shoulders and back, very carefully pulling the older youth into himself. It was the first hug Squall had ever given to anyone aside from his mother or sister, and he felt oddly powerful for overcoming his own fear of initiating any kind of physical intimacy.

"You're an idiot," Squall growled quietly against Seifer's throat, relieved to feel the blond letting go of his forearm and reciprocating his embrace instead. Seifer threw his arms around the brunette's lean framed body, digging his gloved hands into Squall's sides with earnest.

Hesitantly, Squall trailed his fingers to the nape of Seifer's neck and squeezed it, murmuring a coarse, "It's alright, you know. You've got… nothing to prove."

"Squall," the blond passionately ground out his name, while simultaneously pulling him as tight as physics would allow. The dark haired boy smiled delicately, knowing full well that Seifer could not see it. He felt strangely at peace with the world right now, and he couldn't even have tried to explain why. At this point in time, everything seemed fairly irrational altogether, and he was okay with that.

Perhaps, in the end, love really had nothing to do with reason at all.

They remained in that silent embrace for quite some time, breathing each other's scent and feeling each other's bodies move just ever so slightly. Squall had never before felt like he was an anchor for Seifer; usually, it had always been the other way around. But he could tell that, for once, their roles were reversed and Seifer was clinging to _him_ for comfort, and that slight tip in the balance of their relationship instilled Squall with a newfound kind of courage.

"Hey," he breathed against the side of Seifer's neck, the word not much more than a hushed sigh. "Let's get out of here."

Seifer withdrew a few inches at that remark, turning his head just slightly to gaze in Squall's clear, piercing blue eyes that matched the snow blind sky. "I'm okay," the blond declared, sounding less sure than he liked. "I can do this."

"You already have."

Squall's lips lifted into a small smirk as he cocked his head to the side. He noticed the confused air on Seifer's face and chuckled softly. "We're already in a graveyard, remember. This whole thing is a tomb."

Seifer let out a small grunt, allowing his eyes to roam, before returning to Squall's face. "You're right. I never figured it'd be this… romantic."

Frowning, yet still managing to look humored, the brunette replied dryly, "I don't think it's supposed to be."

"Hey, I'm not complaining."

"… Me either."

Seifer pulled him in close once more, pressing a chaste kiss on Squall's cold, ivory cheek. "You're freezing," he declared with a worried undertone, looking his precious friend up and down.

Grimacing, Squall teased, "I told you we should leave like five minutes ago, dumbass."

Laughing, Seifer replied, "Fair enough."

Saying nothing further, Seifer clutched Squall's gloved hand with his own and guided him away from the ruins, back towards the car and ultimately towards the warmth of his home, feeling as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders in more ways than just one.

* * *

"You still cold?" Seifer turned around towards his classmate as they walked into his living room, closing his front door to the freezing winter wonderland outside. Their trip to the Tomb of the Unknown King had been unexpectedly short, but the blond didn't even mind one bit. The drive back had been pleasant, and he had even held Squall's hand for most of the ride, feeling like a stupidly giddy, lovesick young couple. The brunette seemed less unsettled by his physical advances than normal, and Seifer hadn't missed the fact that Squall had initiated a hug between them for the very first time. Usually, it was Seifer who had to make the first move, but not today.

Today, things seemed different somehow, and truthfully, the blond was amazed.

"A little," Squall admitted, visibly shaking as he stopped in the middle of the room. He looked handsome in his rugged, snow dusted outdoors attire, and suddenly, Seifer could no longer help himself. He walked up to the brunette and shoved him up against the nearest wall without warning, providing the freezing dark haired boy with a carnal sort of heat as he French kissed him with all the skill he could call his own.

Squall caught the blond's tongue with his own, tasting the coffee that Seifer had bought at a gas station on their way back. He wasn't sure what was going on with him today, but something was different about kissing Seifer this afternoon. He could feel small, sharp sparks of heat traveling up and down his spinal column, spreading to places he had never really spent much thought on. It was an odd, pleasurable sensation of tingling and tightness, and there was a burning wave of heat that rushed through his body when the blond pressed against him, roaming his torso with his hands.

Suddenly, in a moment of surprise, Seifer abruptly disconnected himself from his lover and pushed away from Squall to walk into the kitchen. Perplexed by the blond's unforeseen departure, Squall remained leaning against the wall for a minute longer, finding himself craving Seifer's touch more than he thought appropriate. Almost angrily, he unzipped his coat and shrugged out of the damp fleece, placing it on a nearby dresser. When he turned around with a scowl, debating on whether to follow Seifer into the kitchen or not, he found himself hit square in the face by a small, spongy kind of object.

"What the _fuck_?"

Looking dumbstruck, Squall stared at Seifer, who was standing a few feet away from him, grinning from ear to ear and holding a bag full of marshmallows.

After the initial moment of surprise had passed, Squall made a harsh sound of annoyance and gestured angrily at the blond.

"You idiot! Have you gone fucking crackers or — _shit_!"

Again, the blond threw a marshmallow at him, hitting him point blank in the forehead. Seifer was roaring with laughter at the pissed off look on Squall's face, but the brunette's stupor only lasted but a second. After that, Seifer had to dart out of the way, because Squall had launched himself at him with the quickness of a mountain lion.

"You punk bastard!" Squall spat, making a go at the bag in Seifer's hands, "Give me that!"

"Nice try, butterfly," Seifer cackled, playfully tiptoeing away from his irritated friend. With a pleased grin, he grabbed an entire handful of marshmallows and lobbed them at Squall's head.

"You fucking dipshit! I'll kick your sorry fucking ass!" Squall threatened violently, albeit not without a tinge of humor to his inflection.

"Bring it, princess," Seifer snickered, provocatively motioning the brunette towards himself while launching another handful of squashy projectiles at his classmate.

Quick to react, Squall caught a few marshmallows in midair, and without hesitation, he threw them straight back at Seifer, clearly determined to wipe the silly grin off his blond friend's face.

"Whoa," the blond whistled as he quickly side stepped around his loveseat to avoid Squall's pass at him. "Careful with that, princess!"

"Bite me, jerk off!"

"Oh, absolutely, where would you like it? On your pretty little ass perhaps, your majesty?" Seifer retorted with a small mock bow, laughingly pitching one marshmallow after another at the brunette, who was relentlessly pursuing him throughout the living room. Within minutes, the place was covered in multicolored bits of marshmallow, biscuits, protein bars, CDs, books, pillows and other random objects that the boys had tossed at each other in their playful chase around Seifer's entire apartment. Shiva was running along with them, letting out playful barks as she streaked through their legs. By that point, both of the boys were laughing like two silly five year olds, and they followed each other around in sprints in a mad game of catch. Finally, when Seifer escaped into the kitchen to look for further ammunition, Squall pounced on him from behind, throwing himself on the blond football player's back with all the enthusiasm he could muster. Grunting, Seifer fell forward against the row of kitchen cabinets, while Squall was dangling from his neck, doling out playful knuckle sandwiches to the blond's jaw.

"What the fuck, you little monkey head," Seifer snorted, backing up against the opposite counter and simply bending backwards to sit Squall on top of it. Before the brunette could have jumped out of his reach, Seifer swiftly turned around and grabbed Squall around the middle, before simply proceeding to tickle him.

"Wh-whoa, wh-what, h-holy shit, wha-hahahaha!"

Squall burst out laughing, while making a few erratic and futile attempts at pushing Seifer away. Looking pleasantly surprised, Seifer cooed, "Well, will you look at that… Someone's ticklish!"

Seifer continued to tickle the brunette's ribs, watching him squirming with a look of purest delight as the younger boy tried to kick him out of reach.

"Q-quit it!" Squall yelled between shrieks of laughter, flailing his clenched fists at Seifer's face, who managed to duck just in time.

"Beg for mercy, Sir Glaresalot!" Seifer ordered theatrically, snickering as he dug his fingers into Squall's arm pits and his ribcage. Squall continued to struggle and laughed a stubborn "N-No way!" Obviously, he was fully determined not to give in to Seifer's ludicrous demands. Of course, when it came down to it, Seifer was at a physical advantage and it didn't take long before the brunette finally yelped, "O-okay, okay, stop, stop, I can't, knock it off, argh!"

"Do you surrender?" Seifer asked with mock ominousness, persistently continuing to tickle the dark haired boy, until Squall, who had teared up with laughter, eventually caved in and screamed, "Yeah, yeah, I do, I do, stop it, stop already! _Stop_!"

Content, Seifer ceased his attempts at torturing Squall into submission and took a couple steps back to relish the sight. For a moment, Squall simply sat on the marble countertop, gasping for air as the blond watched him with interest, looking absurdly pleased with himself. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Squall suddenly sat up and creamed Seifer across the face with the dry biscuit he'd been hiding in his clutched fist all along.

Stumped, the blond stared at Squall, who was leaning backwards and holding his belly, laughing hysterically at the stupefied look on his friend's face. Seifer wasn't sure what stunned him more – the fact that Squall had just cold-bloodedly whacked him in the face with a piece of bread, or that the constantly grumpy boy was actually roaring with laughter. During the entire time they'd known each other, Seifer had never seen the brunette laugh like that; he had to admit, it was incredibly attractive. Seifer's apartment was a mess, and so were they, but right now, none of that mattered. Seifer didn't think he'd ever seen anything hotter than a laughing, disheveled Squall, with his hair tousled in all different directions, his skin flushed, his eyes glittering and his clothes in complete disarray. Seifer could see bits of Squall's tight abs and narrow hips poking through his t-shirt, which was riding halfway up his midriff. His boots were dangling loosely on his feet and his damp khaki pants clung to his ridiculously bangin' body.

All of a sudden, Squall's undeniable hotness struck Seifer like a ton of bricks, and he realized that he had never wanted the brunette more than he did that very moment.

Squall, too, seemed to have noticed that something had changed, because his laughter suddenly faded and he stared back at Seifer with a strange heat in his gaze. Somehow, their friendly banter had turned into something entirely different. Suddenly, and completely out of nowhere, their physical attraction to each other had claimed center stage. Seifer could feel a sharp glare of emotion cutting through his chest when he stared at his classmate, as well as a familiar heat filling his entire body, and judging by the struck look on Squall's face, the brunette boy felt no different. It was then that Seifer realized that this was a rare window of opportunity to act on his consuming desire. He wasn't willing to waste any time, knowing that any minute, the brunette's mood could change once more. Still, he kept himself from simply running towards his dark haired opposite, and instead approached him with two calm, almost seductively slow steps.

When their bodies met, Squall was still sitting on the kitchen counter. Seifer stepped between the brunette's parted legs, simply knocking them further apart with his knee, and he looked upon the other male with dark, burning determination. Squall wasn't smiling, but there was a humored, nearly cocky glint in his eyes that caused Seifer to grunt and hook one hand behind the brunette's neck, yanking him close with an abrupt kind of need. When their lips collided, Seifer no longer noticed the snowy dampness of his own skin or the brunette's; all he saw and heard and felt was Squall.

All he _wanted_ was Squall.

He kissed him hard, lips parted, teeth nipping at delicate bits of pale white and ruby red skin. Squall reciprocated his affection with equal intensity, and he seemed to know exactly what to do with his tongue to make every part of Seifer's tough body go weak.

Well... every body part except but _one_.

Seifer used one arm to wrap it around the boy's waist and yank Squall towards the edge of the marble countertop. Growling, he ground his hips into Squall's, and his deep, carnal desire only reached new heights when he noticed that Squall was just as physically aroused as he was. He could feel the boy's hardness through his khaki pants, and Seifer moved both of his hands to the boy's belt loops, using them for leverage to pull Squall even further into himself. Eventually, this caused Squall to slide off the counter and drop onto his feet. The startled brunette paused momentarily in the act of kissing Seifer, if only to exhale harshly against the blond's open mouth.

"Squall," the blond breathed the other boy's name, trying to rearrange the mess of feverish thoughts inside his head. He tilted his lips to Squall's ear as he pressed himself against the brunette and groaned, "I want you to do something for me."

"Do what...?" Squall growled breathlessly, his head connecting with Seifer's shoulder as he found himself caught between the blond's tall, rock solid body and the kitchen cabinets. Normally, being cornered like that would have bothered him, but right now, it was exactly what he wanted.

Very slowly, Seifer leaned back, forcing Squall to straighten up and look at him. Confusion had meshed with the hungry glare in Squall's eyes, but Seifer only smiled reassuringly. As he languidly brushed the back of his left hand over Squall's groin, surveying the dark haired teen for a reaction, he noted with satisfaction that a raw, sharp gasp escaped the surprised brunette's lips, and although the smaller boy flinched in a manner of reflex, he didn't push Seifer away.

It was exactly the opportunity Seifer had always been waiting for.

"Nothing," Seifer murmured quietly as one of his hands grabbed the back of Squall's head and pulled it closer. Then, he wordlessly reached for the brunette's leather belt and started to unbuckle it without hesitation, never breaking eye contact with the brunette as their gazes burnt into each other. "I want you to do nothing at all."

Squall stared, trying to understand what Seifer was telling him as he was unbuttoning his pants and pulled on the zipper with experienced hands. The actions registered with Squall's mind, but it was happening so fast that he was too confused and too turned on to even struggle. Seifer was acutely aware of this. He could already see that familiar, guarded expression forcing its way back onto Squall's pretty face, and he knew full well that he had to be swift and that he couldn't allow the other boy too much time to over-think what they were doing.

If he wanted to make this happen, he'd have to be fast about it, because as soon as Squall's defenses would rise, everything would come to a complete stand still once more.

"B-But—"

Seifer leaned forward and interrupted Squall's protests with another hungry kiss that robbed the brunette of all rational thought. As he slid his fingertips into Squall's waistband and started to ease the brunette's pants and boxers down over his hipbones, feeling the dark haired boy wincing once more, Seifer nipped at the side of the boy's neck and growled softly into his ear, "It's okay, this won't hurt one bit, Squall. I promise."

**[NC 17 / MA rated part removed - please see author's note at the bottom of page]**

Finally, Squall collapsed on the floor, falling onto his ass right in front of a still perched-down Seifer as his knees ultimately gave way. The blond noted with quiet self-satisfaction that Squall's legs were trembling violently, and his face was pulled into an awestruck, nearly delirious expression dominated by a set of wide, disbelieving eyes that were pure and blue and as wild as a tropical rainstorm.

"S-shit," the brunette was gasping between breaths, sitting amongst a mess of marshmallows and buttermilk biscuits. "H-holy s-_shit_..."

Chuckling, Seifer casually wiped the back of his hand across his lips, before leaning forward. He stemmed his left hand against the counter, next to Squall's head, then brought his mouth to Squall's earlobe, still grinning as he teased in a low, rough voice, "What?"

"That... that..." Squall stammered, apparently not finding the right words. He was breathing about twice as fast as he should have been, and his voice was adorably helpless when he pressed, "That was... that was so… Holy shit... I never... That..."

"What?" Seifer repeated smugly, brushing his lips along Squall's damp temple affectionately as he let out a small laugh. "Have you never had anyone go down on you, or what?"

He had been joking, but when Squall didn't answer, Seifer pulled back slightly to look his younger lover in the eye. To his surprise, Squall's face was serious, albeit still dominated by post-orgasm rapture. At first, the brunette avoided Seifer's gaze, but then his steel blue eyes finally darted a few nervous glances at the stunned blond.

"Wait. Are you serious?" Seifer asked, raising his brows. "_Never_?"

The dark haired boy swallowed, before nodding his head with reluctance. He also noticed that his pants were still halfway around his knees, and he clumsily proceeded to pull them back up where they belonged. Seifer watched him wordlessly, before letting out a stunned whistle. He was genuinely taken aback, although not necessarily in a bad way. He had never quite been able to determine just how sexually experienced Squall really was, but he had always figured that the brunette had at least messed around before, so this came as a bit of a surprise. For a moment, he felt a sting of pity for the brunette, considering he'd never experienced the enjoyment of a fantastic blow job before, but on the other hand, he couldn't help but feel immensely proud over being the first to get Squall off like that.

"Hmm," the blond murmured, his lips drawing into a self-content smirk as he kissed Squall on the nose in manner that was surprisingly gentle and made it quite clear that he demanded nothing in return for the mind numbing pleasure he'd just doled out. "All the better. I kinda like the thought of being your first, actually."

"I..." Squall started, gesturing vaguely with his right hand as the words just sort of came gushing from his lips, unlocked from their usual vault of scared silence and encouraged by Seifer's appreciation of his sexual naivety. "I didn't know that... that this is... that this is how it feels when... when..."

"That this is how it feels when someone sucks you off?" Seifer offered bluntly, looking Squall dead in the eye.

Blushing, Squall admitted, "It... yeah... uh, I mean... Everything... All of it... I-I had no idea... I... I mean, I–"

"Everything?" Seifer cut in, cocking his head with interest. "What do you mean?"

Something in Squall's face was twitching, and the brunette cast down his eyes, looking self-conscious. "Y-yeah... Uh... Everything..."

"Squall," Seifer said sternly, still not understanding. "What do you mean by 'everything'?"

Squall grimaced, trying to explain what apparently he himself didn't quite comprehend.

"I mean... I didn't know... I didn't know that this is how it feels to... to..." he stammered, his voice grinding with the effort of holding in his mess of emotions. "That when you have... when you... you know... Uh... That... when you have, uh... when you have an orgasm, that this is how it feels, and—"

"Whoa, whoa, hold on! Hold it right there!" Seifer exclaimed, rocking backwards so he was balancing himself on the balls of his feet in front of Squall. The brunette was looking back at him with an expression of insecurity. Apparently, he didn't know what to make of Seifer's reaction.

The blond teen's eyes had narrowed, and they were surveying Squall's pretty face with particular intensity.

"Squall. What the hell do you mean, you didn't know that this is how it feels to have an orgasm?" he asked, his voice pointed and serious.

Squall simply held his stare, not saying anything at all now. Seifer continued to study him skeptically, looking him up and down several times, before growling testily, "You're joking, right?"

The brunette wasn't sure what Seifer expected him to say, so he chose to remain silent. His legs were still quivering, and he was trying to steady them with his own hands by wrapping them around his knees. Looking oddly defenseless, he glanced up at the blond, before dropping his head once more with a small sound of frustration.

"Squall," Seifer finally breathed the dark haired boy's name impatiently, before catching Squall's chin with his right hand and lifting it up demandingly. "Seriously. This is a big deal! Are you telling me you've never had an _orgasm_ before tonight? _Never_?"

He didn't need the boy to give any sort of reply, because his answer was written all over his handsome, yet unassuming face. Groaning, Seifer shook his head.

"You're fuckin' kidding me," he sighed as he let go of Squall's chin, causing the brunette to flinch. "How is that even possible? You're seventeen years old! I mean, do you not jerk off?"

"Uh... No..." Squall replied, looking uncomfortable as he bit the corner of his lips, his eyes cutting to the side.

"_Why_?"

Squall shrugged helplessly, "I... I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know? You've gotta have some kind of reason! Everybody jerks off! It's the most normal fuckin' thing in the world!"

There was a flash of something in Squall's eyes that Seifer didn't understand. Of course, he couldn't know that getting raped by his stepfather had all but killed Squall's sex drive. He had never experimented, neither with himself nor with anyone else. He had never had any kind of desire to. The brunette himself couldn't believe that despite his traumatic experiences with sex and his former lack of interest in intimacy, Seifer still managed to turn him on so goddamn much. He didn't know how to explain this to Seifer in a way that would make sense, but fortunately, he didn't need to.

"You know what, don't even worry about it," Seifer suddenly said, and there was an odd, determined spark in his eyes. "It doesn't matter. You are going to be so spoiled, you won't even know what the hell hit you."

"W-what?"

"Trust me, Squall, that just there was nothing. I've got a whole fuckin' world to show you," he declared brazenly, grinning from ear to ear. "We've got a lot of catching up to do, cupcake."

Squall stared at Seifer as if he had lost his mind, but the blond only shook his head. "Not tonight though," he said calmly, smiling gently now as he brushed some of Squall's damp, wayward tresses out of his face. "You look like you're about to fall over."

"I'm fine," Squall muttered testily, a bit of his normal, stubborn persona shining through.

"Hell yeah you are," Seifer chuckled. "Finest guy I've ever seen."

"Shut up," the brunette huffed gruffly, before his expression suddenly became closed. Seifer could tell that something was on the brunette's mind, but he would have never guessed what it was.

"Uhm…" Squall eventually said in a cracked voice as his eyes became dark. "Uh… what… uh… You know… what about you?"

"Huh? What about me?"

Reluctantly, Squall jerked his chin towards Seifer's crotch. He hadn't forgotten how hard the blond had been – how hard he still was, just by the looks of it. Somehow, he felt obligated to return the favor, even though he had no real concept of how to go about it. His body had been abused so many times for the sake of another man's satisfaction that his outlook on lovemaking was entirely skewed. After all, Kato had never, not even once, allowed Squall to experience what an orgasm at the hands of someone else even felt like. Some ruined part of Squall's mind honestly assumed that he didn't deserve the pleasure Seifer had given him, and he was afraid that there was some kind of debt he now had to repay.

Seifer, however, only glanced at his own pelvis in confusion, and it took a few seconds until the brunette's words and gesture finally made sense to him. With a look of honest surprise, Seifer quickly shook his head and leaned forward, placing an affectionate kiss on Squall's forehead before purring, "Nah. This wasn't about me, Squall. Trust me."

Frowning, the brunette protested, "But–"

"Some other time, okay?" the blond cut him off with a smile. "Seriously, this was all about you. You don't owe me anything, okay? I'm perfectly happy like this. Believe me, I am fuckin' psyched you let me take care of you tonight. That was all I wanted, and I can't wait to do it again. I'll spoil your ass rotten."

Of course, Seifer would have been more than ecstatic over any kind of sexual attention by his hot classmate, but he had no intention of pushing his luck tonight. For a while there, he had seriously been wondering whether Squall would ever let him get into his pants. In the end, Seifer had accomplished much more than he had thought possible in such a short amount of time. Squall had finally allowed him to take their relationship a step further, and he hadn't even gone mental afterwards, like Seifer had almost expected him to. Getting his own rocks off could easily wait another while longer.

At this very moment, he couldn't possibly have felt any more satisfied.

"… I guess, now that I think about it, there is one thing you _could_ do," Seifer suddenly pondered, the corners of his lips lifting into a smile.

"What's that?" Squall asked, trying to sound blithe despite the sudden stab of fear inside his heart.

He wasn't quite sure what to expect.

"… Follow me."

Before Squall could have objected, Seifer had grabbed his hand and pulled him onto his feet. Then, he led the dark haired boy through the destroyed apartment, until they finally ended up in Seifer's bedroom. Clasping his arms in front of his chest, Squall watched how Seifer threw aside the covers of his bed. As his pretty face set, Squall mentally steeled himself for what he thought might be to come.

"Take off those wet clothes and get in."

With raised eyebrows, the brunette witnessed how Seifer unceremoniously stripped down to his underwear and climbed into the bed. The tanned eighteen year old immediately disappeared amongst the black satin sheets, before rolling over and facing Squall, who hadn't moved by an inch.

"Come on," the blond said, gesturing invitingly.

Frowning, Squall turned his head aside and muttered, "I need to take a shower."

"Not right now you don't," his opposite declared boldly.

"But–"

"Are you gonna get in, or do I need to come out and get you?"

Squall's left eye twitched irritably, and for a moment, the brunette seriously considered flipping his friend the bird and leaving the room. But then he remembered that Seifer had brought him to his knees with insane pleasure mere minutes ago, and as his cheeks turned hot with embarrassment, he huffed "Fine. Whatever."

Grumbling under his breath, Squall turned away from Seifer and shed his damp clothes, piece by piece. He folded them and placed them neatly on the blond's dresser, not sure why he was getting undressed or what exactly was going on. He didn't take off his leather bracelets, wanting to ignore the scars on his wrists for now and all the pain that was running underneath the surface. Taking in a breath of faltering courage somewhere deep into his chest, he reeled back around towards the bed. Refusing to meet Seifer's expectant gaze, Squall slid beneath the covers, feeling the cold satin fabric sidling up against his skin.

He didn't know what the blond wanted from him, but he did know that whatever it was, he'd seen worse.

Far, far worse.

"Come here."

Then, suddenly, Seifer was there, his warmth nearly swallowing Squall whole. The brunette's body tensed involuntarily when Seifer wrapped one arm around him and pulled him so near that his pale face somehow ended up on the left side of the blond's bare chest. Gulping, Squall immediately attempted to adjust his position, but Seifer's embrace barely permitted any kind of movement at all. It was as if the blond was challenging the law that bodies could only get so close to each other.

'_What is he doing…?'_

As Seifer held the brunette wrapped up against him with one arm, Squall came to realize that this wasn't about sex at all. He laid there with his cheeks burning, feeling the slow pounding of Seifer's heart through the softness of his skin. As he listened to the rhythmic sound, and his hand that was placed somewhere on Seifer's ribcage felt the echoing of the blond's breathing, Squall suddenly realized how very soothing the other boy's presence truly was.

'_Is this what he wanted to do? He wanted to… cuddle?'_

Squall let out a small chortle, causing Seifer to murmur a husky, "What?"

"Nothing," the dark haired teen replied, but Seifer thought that he could almost _hear_ him smiling. "And here I was thinking that only girls like to cuddle."

Seifer laughed at that teasing remark, before growling, "You know, you can call me a girl all night long, if you want, but I really don't give a rat's ass. This feels fucking awesome."

The brunette thought on that statement for a moment, allowing himself to fully savor the closeness of the warm, strong and comforting body that was Seifer. Finally, he let out a breath, relieving some of the pointless tension he'd been holding in since Seifer had led him into the bedroom.

"Yeah…" he murmured quietly. "I guess… It kind of does."

As he laid there, feeling Seifer's large hands caressing his side and the small of his back, he wondered what had happened tonight. Something had changed; something of much significance that he himself didn't quite understand. He could almost feel himself becoming more docile in Seifer's presence, and for a moment, the thought angered him. He wasn't some love struck girl that thrived on the blond's affection, but then again, Seifer had never treated him as one. The way the blond had touched him tonight would have never been befitted for a girl. Still, Squall felt vulnerable, and being vulnerable scared him.

'_Why did I let this happen tonight? And why did none of it feel bad? I… I always figured it would.'_

Truthfully, Squall was almost more stunned than he was scared. What Seifer had done to him back in the kitchen had felt like nothing he had ever experienced before, and he'd had sex more times than he could've counted. Of course, he'd always known that what Kato was doing to him wasn't sex at all – it was rape, but in Squall's mind, the two had never been much different. He had never been able to fathom that sexual activities could actually feel good, and in the past, even Seifer's advances had triggered his defenses to go haywire. He remembered the first night Seifer had kissed him quite clearly, but for some reason, things had changed since then.

'_I think… I finally realized that Seifer is nothing like Kato.'_

It had never struck Squall so clearly that Seifer would never, ever force him to do anything sexual. The blond teenager was kind and gentle beneath a rough player exterior, and he made a conscious effort to make Squall feel wanted and safe. The brunette no longer felt threatened by his classmate, and although it was still difficult for him to trust or even remotely attempt to ignore the past, he had made mental note of all the differences between Kato's and Seifer's behavior. His stepfather had touched him so many times, and yet he had never bothered to make him feel good. Seifer had made the whole act of touching Squall about the brunette's pleasure alone, and the blond had faced him that whole time, never taking his eyes off him, while Kato would usually avoid his face at all cost.

Suddenly, Squall noticed the blond tightening his hold on him even more, and he could feel Seifer's chin coming to rest on the top of his head. He wondered if the eighteen year old would ask him questions and demand what he was thinking about, considering he'd been quiet for so long, but Seifer did nothing of that sort. Instead, the blond football player sighed into the mess that was Squall's hair and crowed, "Thank you."

"Huh?" Squall grunted, blindsided by that remark. He moved his head slightly, as if to look up at the blond, but Seifer was clutching him too tightly.

"Thank you?" the brunette finally repeated, confusedly watching the rise and fall of Seifer's chest. "What the hell for?"

"For being here. For being you," Seifer said softly, and he could feel the boy leaning against him swallowing. "For letting me hold on to you like this, even though I know what a little hard ass you are."

Squall snorted, but he bit back any sarcastic response that initially jumped on his quick tongue. Instead, he screwed up his face, allowing Seifer's kind words to sink in. For some reason, they didn't quite add up inside his head.

'_Why would he thank me for being myself? I've been an asshole to him this whole time. He really is strange. I still don't get why he likes me… but I guess I'm kinda glad that he does.'_

"You know," Seifer suddenly said, in a voice that had become thoughtful, "I really don't understand the kind of life you've been leading."

"… What do you mean?" Squall asked, feeling slightly defensive. He wasn't sure whether he would like the direction Seifer's words were taking.

"You're really hot, Squall," the blond remarked, and he chuckled at the derisive snort that Squall let out in reaction to that statement. "I'm serious. I just don't understand how you've never messed around with anyone before. It seems crazy to me."

The dark haired boy paused, knowing that Seifer was trying to be nice, and yet his words bothered him.

Why did he have to bring this up now?

"It was never a priority, that's all," the brunette eventually replied coldly.

"Is that it?" Seifer questioned, sounding unconvinced.

This time, Squall didn't answer. He stared at his wristbands in response, feeling the scars that were etched into his skin underneath as much as he could feel every single one of his fingers and toes. His left palm with the already healing lacerations from the night before was still folded against Seifer's torso, against the warm skin and the strong muscles that shifted with each breath the blond took.

"No," the dark haired teen finally admitted, slowly curling his fingers to a fist. "I guess… It was never something I wanted."

"Why not?"

"Because…" Squall started, hesitating for a little while as he tried to sort through his emotions. Finally, he produced a weak smile that Seifer couldn't see and said, "Because I didn't know any better."

For a moment, Seifer said nothing. He wondered at his friend's answer, contemplating its depth. Squall had never been easy for him to understand, and sometimes, he wondered why the brunette was so evasive. He'd tell him things that made no sense, and yet they did. Squall had a way of saying things when he was completely silent, but when he spoke, Seifer begun to question everything he had ever believed to have figured out about the elusive brunette teen.

'_I still don't get it. I think he means that he was never interested in sex, because he didn't know that it would actually feel good. I wonder if he thought that sex would be painful, or scary? Or maybe just gay sex? Why would he think that, though? What's his reason? He's never had sex before, obviously. I mean, I guess I get it. Sex can be very painful if you don't know what you're doing, or if your partner doesn't give a shit about you. I hope he's gotten the hint by now that I know __**exactly**__ what I'm doing, and that I'd never hurt him. Hmm. This whole thing is weird. Maybe this has something to do with his mom and his dad. Or maybe not. I know he told me about his mother having a lot of different lovers when he was little. Maybe Squall saw something bad? I think something happened when he was young and impressionable. I just don't know what. … Maybe I just need to trust my instincts.'_

"Something hurt you," the blond finally said, the words almost more of a statement than a guess.

"A lot of things did," Squall murmured vaguely, slowly tracing his index finger from Seifer's body to the sheet that was covering both of them. The touch of satin bedding was so familiar to him, and he instantly quenched the memories that stirred within his mind at the sensation. He laid motionless for a while, drowning in his own thoughts, refusing to say anything else. Finally, he blew out a breath and shifted in Seifer's embrace to turn away from the blond and face the nearest wall instead. Some of the cozy warmth he had savored only minutes ago had suddenly dissipated, and the realization of it made him feel bitter and savage inside.

'_I hate this. Why am I so angry?'_

He was staring at the white wall, stewing silently on his own hurt, fury and remorse, until Seifer suddenly rolled onto his side and pushed against him from behind, while affectionately lacing his right arm around Squall's body. The brunette could hear his heart thumping out of pace a few times, startled by the abrupt change in their position. Seifer's warm breath was ghosting the nape of his neck, and his voice was little more than a purr when he spoke.

"Tell me what it was," the older teen ordered in a low tone, "And I will never let it hurt you again."

Something was burning in Squall's eyes, and for a second, he was lost in the love that his heart had always guarded so fiercely. The brunette had never imagined that someone would enter his life so boldly and that Seifer would become so unstoppable in his quest of making Squall fall for him. Yet he was there, almost bringing tears to his eyes with his proud confessions and his blazing proclamations of intending to protect Squall against any kind of harm.

"There's no need," the lean framed brunette answered quietly, drawing both of his arms close to his body. "Everything's fine now."

As he pressed his back against Seifer's chest and moved his hand somewhere close to the blond's, he knew that he was lying. He had figured out by now that his willful touch would distract Seifer, and that it would make him seem more normal and emotionally balanced than he really was. And yet, although he felt despicable for deceiving his friend so deliberately as Seifer wordlessly nuzzled against him, perhaps this really _was_ the closest he'd ever been to 'being fine' in his entire life. His world as he had known it had been blown away in the mere blink of an eye, but in some aspects, the changes had been for the better. He had found strength and comfort and a valuable ally in Seifer Almasy, and after meeting his missing father, Laguna, even his own, mysterious past finally started to make at least a little bit more sense. He knew that he still had a long way to go and that his stepfather was far from being out of the picture, but for right now, it really _was_ okay.

Squall's world was still turning, and despite everything, he was no longer scared of tomorrow.

-:-

No regrets  
Not this time  
I'm gonna let my heart defeat my mind  
Let your love  
Make me whole  
I think I'm finally feeling something.

"_The Motions" – Matthew West_

-:-

* * *

Hello, folks. Long time no see. I wanted to bring you Ch 33 before the end of the year, and I succeeded. Hopefully you'll find that it turned out to be a bit lighter fare than the latest chapters have been. I'm finally getting towards the end of the story, and things are starting to unfold rather fast. It's a bit weird to me, considering it has taken this long to get here. I guess everything has been kind of a prelude to what is going to happen next. I have stuck with my original plot line ideas for the most part, and although it wasn't easy to write that much, I feel it was worth it.

Unfortunately, I cannot post the entire chapter on here, due to this site's restrictions. If you wish to read the NC 17/MA rated part, as usual, please proceed to my livejournal. You will find the link in my author profile on here. It's fairly short and you shouldn't need to read the Extra in order to grasp what happened, if you don't want to, but if you do, I hope you enjoy it.


	34. Ashes to Ashes

-:-  
**Chapter 34  
****Ashes to Ashes**

"_You're the one who's holding onto me."_

-:-

"So... what's that sculpture you've been working on, anyway?"

Throwing a skeptical sideway glance at his classmate, Squall clutched the opaque black plastic bag he'd been carrying under his arm a bit more tightly in response to that question. An amused smirk spread across Seifer's face as he watched him and took note of the wary glare of suspicion that came alight in his brunette friend's eyes. Unable to help himself, Seifer let out a laugh.

"What?" the blond snickered in a teasing tone of voice. "Is it some kind of secret?"

"No," Squall bit back reluctantly, while skittishly avoiding his classmate's provocative gaze.

Obviously, Seifer was on to something.

"It's a sculpture of my penis, isn't it?"

Rolling his eyes, Squall flipped the obnoxious blond his left middle finger as they were making their way from a rushed lunch at Ward's Diner back to Deling City High School. He considered making some kind of snappy remark, but came to the conclusion that Seifer would only take it as a cue to ridicule him further. Honestly, the eighteen year old could be such a fucking asshat.

"Aww, c'mon sunshine," Seifer attempted to sweet-talk him as he prodded the lean brunette in the side. "Why won't you tell me?"

"Because you're a nosy bastard, and it's none of your business, that's why," Squall replied with a pissed off grunt. "Quit pestering me."

"Well, just tell me what it is and I'll leave you alone, I promise," the blond continued to try to persuade him, which only earned him an icy glare. "Seriously, c'mon, don't be like that. What is it?"

"I'm not telling you."

"But—"

"Did I stutter?" Squall cut him off with an ominous grimace. "I said, I'm not telling you. Just get it out of your fucking system already."

"Man, that's just plain harsh, cupcake," Seifer lamented playfully as he pushed his bottom lip out into a pout.

"You'll live," the brunette clipped as he cocked an unimpressed brow at Seifer's lousy display of feigned hurt.

"What if I don't?"

"Let's just say it's a risk I'm willing to take."

Seifer only laughed in response, knowing full well that he was never going to coax this one out of the brunette. It had been worth a shot, of course, and he never grew tired of a bit of playful banter with his handsome classmate. Sadly, Squall was annoyingly skilled at barricading himself against Seifer's intrigue, and sometimes it bothered the blond more than it did on other occasions. On this beautiful, snow clad Wednesday afternoon, Seifer Almasy was hardly in the mood to start a serious argument with his quick tempered friend... especially since he was still love struck from their sexual encounter of the previous day.

'_I still can't believe he let me go down on him... Especially since he's never had that done to him before. I guess I had no idea how fuckin' inexperienced he really is. I mean, I would've never thought that there was seriously a seventeen year old guy out there who's never had an orgasm before. Completely un-fucking-believable. Well... I sure popped that cherry, didn't I?'_

Looking pleased with himself, Seifer reminisced about the night before, at his apartment, when he'd cuddled with Squall in bed for hours and been quite reluctant to finally let the boy go home to get ready for the next day of school. This morning, he had been stupidly excited to see the brunette again, and it was almost as if something about Squall had changed overnight. Sure, Seifer had been insanely attracted to the mind-bendingly handsome teen ever since they had met for the very first time, but his infatuation with the younger boy had apparently reached startling new heights; every time he looked at his friend, Seifer couldn't help but smile dumbly, and he found that Squall looked even hotter today than he had on any other given day. Honestly, it had taken a lot of willpower from Seifer to _not _rip those dark green khaki pants and that black, form hugging thermal shirt off the brunette while they'd been eating lunch at the restaurant. When he looked at the dark haired boy now, while they were slowly crossing the parking lot of their school, he felt a funny pinching feeling in his gut, and an almost unbearable urge to throw his arms around his lover and pin him up against the next best fucking pickup truck.

'_Fuck, my hormones are in goddamn overdrive this morning. Jesus. Man, he's just so damn **hot** though. I wanna see that look on his face again... the one he had when we were in the kitchen and he fell on the floor after I made him come. I have never seen anything like that before. Holy shit, that was so fucking hot.'_

"You have history now, right?"

Obviously, Squall had addressed that sobering question to him, and Seifer regarded him with a quick glance as he tried to keep his libido in check.

"Uhh... oh, yeah, yeah," he said, scratching his temple as he willed his thought process away from Squall's enticing nether regions. "Come to think of it, I don't think I did my homework."

With a snort, the smaller boy replied disdainfully, "I wish I could say I'm surprised."

"Hey, it's not my fault! You've been distracting me!"

Narrowing his eyes, Squall offered with just the tiniest growl in his voice, "I can fix that for you."

"Uh, no thanks," Seifer shot back almost hastily. "I kinda like it when you distract me."

"Then learn to fucking multitask."

Chuckling at Squall's pragmatic response, Seifer suddenly noticed that the younger boy had come to a halt about a step or two behind him. Glancing at him as he turned around, the blond found that his friend looked thoughtful.

"Hey, what's the matter?" Seifer asked, cocking his head.

"I should drop this off at the car," Squall explained, motioning towards the mysterious plastic bag that he had picked up from Fujin during their last art class. "I meant to do it earlier, but I forgot. I left my books for the rest of the day in the car, too."

"Oh, right," Seifer said with an understanding nod, recalling that Squall had driven his mother's Mercedes to school instead of his motorcycle, due to the snow. "I'll come with you."

"No, it's alright. I parked at the other end of the parking lot. You'll be late for class."

Shrugging, the blond replied off-handedly, "I don't care."

"I know you don't, but _I_ do," Squall grimaced. "I have biology, and it always starts late anyway, because we have to set up the lab. I'll be fine."

"Well, alright," the older boy agreed reluctantly as he hoisted his backpack further onto his right shoulder. "Guess I'll see you after school, then?"

"I have to work," Squall informed him matter-of-factly, obviously neither agreeing nor disagreeing to the blond's suggestion.

Seifer snarled.

The brunette was such a right fucking little diplomat.

"Alright, I'll come by Ward's after the gym to hang out with ya," the blond stated, not asking for permission, knowing he didn't need to, anyway. He had found that Squall had been unusually tolerant of his presence since the incident with Laguna. He also knew that, regardless of how unperturbed the brunette might have seemed to any unknowing bystander, his freshly torn wounds were far from healed. He needed someone by his side right now, even if he'd sooner marry Irvine than admit to something like that, and Seifer certainly _wasn't_ planning on going anywhere.

'_I'll be there when you need me, even if you tell me to go away. I promise.'_

So they parted from each other without another word or gesture, and as Seifer followed the rest of the Deling High students into the school building, Squall made his way into the opposite direction. It was cold outside, and he drew his jacket a bit more tightly around himself as he picked up his pace. He really didn't want to be late for class, but he also wasn't planning on lugging his sculpting project around all day long. He didn't want to run the risk of breaking it, or Seifer sneaking a peek when he wasn't paying attention.

'_It's not really that I mind him seeing it... I just don't want him to see it right now. It's kind of... embarrassing.'_

Squall sighed as he lowered his gaze to the bag that he held clutched underneath his arm, feeling the edges of the sculpture digging into his skin. It was made of clay and had a decent weight to it. As he stalked down the snow crusted sidewalk in his black leather boots, scanning the parking lot for his mother's black luxury sedan off in the distance, Squall's right hand reached into his back pocket to retrieve his car keys.

He didn't understand what happened next.

Something sharp struck his lower leg from behind as he was walking, causing his knee to buckle in reflex. As he lost his footing with a surprised gasp, Squall's arms reeled helplessly and he extended his hands to break his fall. He landed with his shins and his palms in the snow, wincing at the sharp and unexpected impact. His expression was perplexed as his eyes cut to the left to find his bag, which had landed on the ground a little ways off to his side. For a brief moment, he considered the possibility that he had just tripped on a patch of ice, but when he saw the shadow of a figure rising up from behind him, he realized that he knew so much better than that.

This had been no accident.

Before he'd had a chance to react, the person hurried past him, picking up the plastic bag that Squall had been forced to drop during his fall. Instead of stopping or turning around to return the brunette's possession, however, the short, slender figure with the long brown hair continued to press on hastily. For a moment, Squall's mind drew a blank, but in the end, he barely had to look twice at his assailant to make out who he was dealing with.

'_... Rinoa?'_

"What the... Hey!"

Irritated, Squall pushed himself back up onto his feet. He only dusted the snow off his pants briefly as he watched the retreating girl in confusion. Rinoa continued to walk away from him at a brisk pace, her light blue winter coat billowing around her hips, and it looked to Squall as if she was talking on her cell phone.

"What the fuck..."

For a long second, the brunette genuinely tried to hash out what the hell had just happened, but it quickly dawned on him that this was probably the scorned girl's stupid idea of revenge. Of course, part of him had half-expected something like this to happen, and much sooner at that. Yet, he was angry at himself for being less prepared than he should have been.

"Rinoa!" he yelled after her, not seriously expecting a response. Scowling, he watched how she seemingly made her way towards the football field, and before he could have thought better of it, he was following her.

The girl was moving quickly despite the heeled suede boots she was wearing. Squall could feel himself slipping a number of times as he cut across the front lawn of the school building, and he had to give Rinoa credit for keeping her balance as well as she did. The dark haired girl didn't turn around to acknowledge him once, and she seemed determined to get away from him as quickly as she could without falling into a sprint.

'_That dumb bimbo. What the hell is she doing? I'm so sick of her childish shit. I can't believe I have to chase her around the whole fucking school just to get my stuff back.'_

Annoyed, Squall continued to follow his female classmate past the football field and towards one of the brick equipment storage buildings located near the tennis courts. He didn't know where the hell the girl thought she was going, really, because they would soon reach the fenced-in outer perimeter of the school. Squall didn't bother putting any more wasted effort into yelling Rinoa's name, knowing full well that she wasn't going to listen, anyway.

'_We're going to be late for class. This is ridiculous.'_

Finally, after what seemed like a chase worth at least five or ten minutes, Rinoa cocked her head over her shoulder briefly, her cold brown eyes finding Squall's across the snowed in field. The boy paused for merely an instant, puzzled by the strange, triumphant expression flitting across the girl's face, before she suddenly disappeared behind the storage building.

'_The hell...?'_

His stride slowed out of instinct, but although Squall could feel a strange, nagging discomfort rising in the center of his stomach, he was well aware that he would never recover his belongings if he wasn't willing to confront the one female he had despised for the greater part of his high school years.

'... _Not like I have much of a choice.'_

Shaking his head, Squall pushed some wayward strands of hair out of his face and proceeded to turn the corner of the storage shed. His narrowed blue eyes barely managed to catch a glimpse of Rinoa, standing an insignificant distance away from him in an expectant sort of pose, before he felt himself yanked to the side by a strong pair of hands.

'_What the—'_

The air was forced out of his lungs when Squall's back and head connected harshly with the brick wall behind him. His sight whitened out from the sudden impact and his feet staggered through the snow as he attempted to find some kind of leverage. In the end, Squall barely managed to keep himself from falling for the second time that day. As soon as he had regained a marginal amount of balance, Squall's hectic gaze flung from side to side to assess the situation, and he let out a sharp gasp when he came to understand who had _really_ been waiting for him behind that building.

'_You can't be serious.'_

Sucking in a breath, Squall continued to stand with his back against the rough wall of the old building. Rinoa Heartilly was still lingering a few feet in front of him, twirling her long brown hair in her right hand and holding Squall's bag in the other, allowing it to hang slack by her side. Her dark eyes were unfocused, distant with some sort of grudge that Squall couldn't fully understand. He knew that she was bitter over her embarrassment at Seifer's apartment a few days ago, but so much had happened in Squall's life since then that he couldn't even fathom why any of it would be a big deal.

Apparently, Rinoa didn't share his careless opinion, and neither did the guys that had spread out strategically around Squall's current position.

The diminutive girl was flanked by three tall, physically impressive males that Squall knew much better than he had ever cared to – they were Jeff and his two best friends and faithful pea-brained cronies, Chris and Mike. The brunette didn't know for sure why Jeff and his friends were present, but unfortunately, he had a fairly solid idea. He figured that Rinoa had either brought them along for brawns while she'd spend a few minutes of her time on ridiculing him as she had done so many times before, or worse, she had informed Jeff about the brunette's romantic relationship with Seifer. The teenage bully had hinted at his own, twisted interest in Squall on several occasions, and at this point, nothing good was going to come of it.

Squall knew that he was in a world of trouble when Jeff was looking at him as if all his Christmases had come at once.

"Rinoa," Squall pressed the girl's name, keeping his voice as unimpressed as he could as his eyes moved from Jeff to the brown haired female, "What the fuck is this? What do you want?"

"... What do _I _want?" she repeated his question, suddenly lifting her gaze and giving him a calm, cold look as she dropped both of her arms to her side. "I don't want anything from you, Squall."

He frowned at the disinterest he saw in her posture and her zombie-like expression, feeling that something was very wrong with this picture. He couldn't make sense of what was going on, and that notion was slowly starting to eat away at his confidence.

"Then why did you steal my shit and bring me out here?" Squall shot back aggressively. "And why are _they_ here?"

"Oh. I believe they wanna talk to you," she muttered, and there was a strange coyness in her voice that Squall didn't like.

"What the fuck could those half-wits possibly wanna talk about?" he bit under his breath, while slowly inching further against the wall behind him as he was mentally searching for a way out.

He had been foolish to follow Rinoa out here, that much was clear to him. They were too far away from the main school complex, and they were shielded from sight by the building and an arrangement of shrubs and trees. Other students and teachers rarely came out this way, especially during class hours. The girl had picked this spot wisely. Nobody would miss him right now, because Seifer was sitting in a different lecture, and Irvine had never showed up for school today. His science teacher, Quistis Trepe, would hardly even notice that he wasn't in class, and even if she did, it wasn't as if she was about to come searching for him. He'd be just another student that had missed attendance – nothing more, nothing less.

There was something finite and trapped about his situation, and it scared him more than he liked to admit.

"Oh, well, see... we heard this little rumor, princess," Jeff finally drawled languidly, while making a calculated step in Squall's direction. The brunette noted semi-consciously how Jeff's cronies moved with their leader in a narrow half-circle, ultimately trapping Squall where he stood. "It's actually nothing new. I mean, I've heard advertisement of your excellent cock sucking skills before, but man, I had no idea you were blowing that new fag, Seifer Almasy. I mean, who would've guessed?"

Squall cut his eyes towards Rinoa, fuming at the mute satisfaction he read in her foul, snobbish features. Through all the years in which she had deliberately made his life at Deling City high school a living hell, he had never hated her as much as he did that very moment.

"I don't give half a shit what you've heard," Squall replied icily, returning his attention to Jeff. "I don't have time for this."

He pushed himself off the wall, making a half-hearted attempt at leaving, but he immediately found himself thrown back against the hard brick surface by a punch in the face that had been brutal enough to knock his teeth out. Before he could have reacted further, he felt many hands and shoulders pinning him against the wall, and he was left gasping for air by a few well-placed blows to his head and ribcage.

"You stay right where you are, you dumb little shit," Jeff's voice hissed somewhere close by his left ear, and Squall stunned back out of reflex, sickened by the violent invasion of his personal space. Another fist collided with the side of his face in return, causing him to bite his cheek. He spat out against the blood filling his mouth, and the coppery taste that spread across his tongue.

Squall instantly knew that things had just gone from bad to worse, because Jeff had never before dared to hit him in the face.

"What the fuck do you want?" Squall forced between coughs, while he was being trapped between Jeff and the wall. He scrambled to break the haphazard grip that Mike and Chris had on his shoulders, but his efforts were only rewarded by Jeff taking another swing at his head, this time hitting him in the left eye and the forehead. For a moment, it hurt so much that Squall could barely breathe. He felt something hot splashing down the center of his face as he fell back against the storage shed, and he didn't have to guess twice on what it was.

"F-fuck... ugh... G-get off me!" the brunette ordered, and although his voice was unsteady, his determination was not. Out of the corner of his throbbing left eye, he could see Mike's ugly, sneering mug within his reach, and without hesitation, Squall drew back his right arm and socked the taller boy in the face as hard as he'd ever learned how.

"Oh _shit_!"

Clearly not expecting that kind of resistance, Mike stumbled backwards in shock, and Squall noted with satisfaction the gush of bright red blood that came rushing from the other boy's nose. He wasn't planning on relishing his own triumph for long, though; quickly, he attempted to free himself from Chris' hands, which were somewhere near his neck now. Before he'd gained so much as a couple inches of ground on the surprised boys, though, Jeff had swiftly kicked him in the legs and swept the ground out from underneath him.

By the time he'd realized what had hit him, Squall was face down in the snow, letting out a muffled noise of surprise and frustration. He rolled over as fast as he could, but regretted that hasty decision almost instantly when Jeff thrust his steel toed boot into his abdomen.

At first, the pain was so intense that Squall feared he was going to pass out. The dull blow knocked the wind right out of him, leaving him groaning and gasping for air. Reflexively, he pulled his knees closer to his chest, and he used his arms to guard himself against the other kicks that followed the one which had preceded them. Somewhere in the background, amidst the white noise screaming a crescendo in his ears, he could hear Mike howling about a broken nose, but Squall neither cared nor thought that it made any kind of noteworthy difference how badly he had possibly injured his attacker.

At this rate, he wasn't going to make it out of this one.

"You little piece of shit! You need to learn your fucking _place_!"

By the time Jeff had ceased kicking him and bent down to yank Squall upwards by his black canvas jacket, the brunette's hands, arms and face were covered in blood. What little he was able to see out of his watering left eye was blurry at best, and there was a constant pounding in the back of his head. He was nauseous, seemingly robbed of his ability to breathe, and at this point, he had no idea what he was doing anymore. Shaking, he reached for Jeff's hands, which had wrenched into the fabric of his coat. He tried to pry the black haired assailant off himself, but his efforts only earned him a sharp kick in the back by one of Jeff's friends.

"On your knees, bitch!" the leader of the boys hissed at him as he let go of his jacket, and Squall only complied because he couldn't have gotten onto his feet if he had tried. Panting, he was sitting on his bruised shins in front of Jeff, his mangled knuckles resting on his thighs. The brunette's hair was sticking to him with a mixture of sweat and blood, and he kept his head low, staring helplessly at the scarlet red blossoms that formed beneath him in the snow.

"You are a dumb little faggot, you know that, Leonhart?" Jeff bellowed angrily, while slapping the right side of Squall's head. "Who do you think you're fucking with here? Huh?"

"You're... fucking mental..." Squall groaned, balling his hands to defiant fists as his vision was swimming before his eyes. He didn't know how he had ended up there on the ground, beaten down to nothing much more significant than a bloody pulp, but he knew that it wasn't over and that obedience would likely get him nowhere. If there was one thing he would never be able to do, it was to give up, regardless of how much he would ever hurt or bleed or break.

Giving up had never been part of his nature, and that was not about to change today. His stubborn and perhaps at times foolish pride was the only reason he had ever made it this far in the first fucking place.

"You're a pathetic little _whore_, Leonhart, just like your father," the cruel guy in front of Squall snarled, pouring his long-nurtured grudge towards the brunette into every single syllable. "Your attitude ends here, princess, you understand that? Because I will _fuck_ it out of you if I have to!"

Squall flinched at the threat, which held more infliction over the brunette than any kick or punch in the world ever would. He wanted to think that Jeff and his cronies were just full of shit. He wanted to think that the black haired teen's provocative words were nothing but perverse, empty threats, but in the end, he would have never put sexual assault past any of them.

"W-whatever... Just... ugh... get away from me," Squall finally hissed, his inflection somewhere between commanding and acquiescent as he twisted his gaze upwards, finding his torturer barely an arm's length away from him. He could tell that Chris was standing somewhere to his right, and he assumed that Mike was positioned closely behind him.

To his steadily rising despair, he had to admit that there was no way he'd be able to escape the three in his current condition.

"Yeah, I don't think so," Jeff announced coldly and licked his lips. "After all, I wanna see if you're as good as advertised."

Squall recoiled when the older teenager leaned down to him and grabbed a fistful of his hair, roughly yanking his head into his neck. Squall struggled against the sadistic gesture and tried to grab his tormenter's arms, but Jeff only tightened his grip in return.

"D-don't," Squall stammered in an off pitch tone, hysterically trying to turn his face away. "Don't... _touch me_..."

"How about you save your breath and do what you were born to do, faggot?" the other boy rejected his frantic directive with a suggestive sneer.

"F-fuck you... No..." the brunette growled, trying to swallow down his panic and the dizziness that suddenly invaded his mind.

His bright blue eyes flitted to the left and right, still pointlessly searching for a way out. He blinked against the blood that continued to run down his face from his forehead and his scalp, making it nearly impossible for him to focus. Then, suddenly, at the very edge of his fuzzy peripheral vision, he noticed a smaller figure appearing from behind his assailant.

"Hey... Jeff. I think that's enough."

Squall recognized the person's smooth soprano voice, which had always been like poison to his ears. Admittedly, he was confused to hear Rinoa trying to reason with the bat-shit crazy bully she had set on Squall in the first place. Then again, he didn't think that his brain could particularly be trusted right now after having been pummeled into a state of near-delirium.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Jeff snarled at her impatiently, before turning his focus back to Squall. "I'm not nearly done with him yet."

"Seriously? Look at him. He can't even stand. Are you trying to kill him?"

"I wasn't talking about _beating_ him," Jeff explained cunningly, while tilting Squall's head back just a little bit further until all the brunette could see was the dull grey afternoon sky above him. "I mean, look at that pretty faggot mouth he's got. I can't let that go to waste, now, can I? It's not like he isn't used to sucking dick, either. What's another one at this point, huh?"

"That's not funny, Jeff," the girl bristled, sounding genuinely disturbed now.

Apparently, she had never realized the full extent of her friend's madness.

"Do you hear me laughing, Rinoa?" the guy retorted, and his inflection held a frightening chill.

"I'm serious, stop," she insisted, more bravery to her voice than Squall would have ever given her credit for. "You can't do that."

"Oh, I can't?" Jeff replied sarcastically. "Watch me."

When Squall heard the familiar sound of a pant zipper being pulled down, panic hit his chest with the force of a freight train. Immediately, he begun to struggle again, jerking his torso and his head to the side and trying to push Jeff away until someone behind him grabbed his arms and forced them violently behind his back.

"Hold the _fuck_ still!" Jeff spat, yanking Squall's head towards himself until their noses were almost touching. The brunette stared at his tormenter out of glassy, disoriented blue eyes that were burning with mute hatred.

"G-get your... ugh... hands off me," Squall ordered in a broken voice, grimacing when Jeff only pulled his hair tighter in response. He could see Rinoa standing closely behind her brutal companion, her gaze fixed upon Squall's face. She wasn't blinking at all, and although the brunette could see no remorse in her stupidly pretty features, he thought that she suddenly looked openly terrified.

'_This is... insane... How... did this even happen...?'_

With a pained groan, Squall tried to take a breath in through his clogged nose, not wanting to open his mouth when Jeff's face was so obnoxiously close. However, Squall realized that he was accomplishing nothing but sucking the blood deeper into his esophagus, and he quickly coughed it back up, disgusted when he felt it running in a trail down his chin. Rinoa flinched at the troubling sight, before turning to Jeff once more.

"You need to stop," she whimpered, gesturing towards the maltreated, kneeling boy in front of her. "Look what you've done to him! He's seriously hurt. You were only supposed to rough him up a little. It wasn't supposed to go this far!"

"You should've thought of that before you brought him out here," the bully replied cynically.

"Well, I'm telling you to stop now! This is _enough_!"

"Oh, shut the fuck up already," Jeff growled in a bored voice, barely even acknowledging her with a spare glance as he continued to survey Squall's beaten face. "You really think this was ever about you or your stupid little revenge trip? Fuck. You're dumber than you look, Rinoa."

Stunning back with an expression of outrage, Rinoa merely gaped at the muscular black haired teen. For years, she'd considered him a friend and an ally, but of course, she'd also never exactly thought him to be particularly bright. All in all, she'd always believed that Jeff was as effortlessly manipulated as all the other boys at her school, who were so easily impressed by a nice set of tits or the prospect of gaining a few minutes of her physical attention.

She only now realized that Jeff's interests had never been towards her.

With a satisfied grin, Jeff started to unbuckle his belt with one hand, the other still submerged in the tangled, bloody mess that was Squall's hair. The brunette watched his torturer's every movement out of wide eyes, and when Jeff suddenly reached inside his pants, Squall hectically attempted to free himself once more by throwing himself against the arms that were holding him captive.

"N-no," Squall stammered hysterically as he thrashed around, "Let go! Don't t-touch me!"

"Oh, come on, don't act all prude on me now, princess," Jeff chuckled, regarding the boy's senseless efforts with a crude smile, noting with satisfaction that Squall would never be able to free himself. "I know you love being down on your knees like that. It's your favorite position in the whole wide world, isn't it? All that's missing is a dick in your mouth, but I'm about to take care of that for ya."

"Y-You... Anything you get near my face... you lose... I promise you," Squall threatened heatedly, his breath coming in short, aborted gasps. "You... psychotic... piece of shit!"

"You flatter me, princess," the sadistic boy said with a grin, but his voice was cold and hard as steel. "But I'll tell you this... if you so much as _graze_ my shit with your teeth, I'll make sure you'll need dentures for the rest of your life, you hear me?"

"You fuck," Squall hissed as face twisted, "Y-you sick, delusional f-fuck."

"That's nice, you know, but we don't have time for poetry here, princess," Jeff bit back slowly, the words long and drawn almost perversely. "I'm well aware of my charms, so how about you quit wasting my time and open the fuck up. It's not gonna suck itself."

The minute Jeff let go of Squall's hair and wrenched his fingers around the brunette's angular jaw instead, Rinoa stepped forward and took a hold of the bully's muscular forearm, yanking on it with as much raw force and determination as her tiny body could conjure up.

"Stop it!" she screeched, actually managing to break Jeff's grip on his victim. "You're sick! What's the matter with you?"

Even Squall couldn't help but cringe when he watched how Jeff drew back his arm and backhanded Rinoa across the face hard enough to send her flying backwards and onto the ground. Shocked, she was holding the left side of her head as she cowered a little ways away from him, and her eyes had welled up with tears of anger, hurt and disgrace.

"Back the _fuck_ off, bitch, before I lose my patience with you!" Jeff yelled at her, causing her to shrink and shudder in fear. When he was assured that he had made enough of an impression on her to keep her pointless heroics at bay, he quickly gestured towards his second lackey, Chris, to grab a hold of their victim.

"Put him on the ground and keep him down," the black haired youth ordered, spitting out into the snow before Squall. "I've had enough of this shit. This is taking too long."

"What?" Mike, who was still holding Squall's arms firmly behind his back, asked dumbly. Obviously, he didn't understand this new twist in Jeff's plans.

"I said, _put him on the ground_," Jeff repeated impatiently, and as if to emphasize his demands, he kicked Squall with so much force that his body was thrown sideways into the snow and Mike had no option but to follow suit. The brunette let out a pained grunt as the tall blond who'd been holding him captive landed on top of him with a thud, but before he had a chance at making another attempt at an escape, both Chris and Mike were already pinning him on his belly into the snow. Desperately, he tried to raise his head, and although his range of motion was pitiful at best, he could suddenly see Rinoa out of the corner of his eyes, her cell phone pressed to her left ear as tears were streaming down her pale face and she tried to keep her chin low. There was a nasty red welt spreading on her cheek bone, and her terrified gaze kept flying back towards Jeff, as if she was worried he'd turn his attention back towards her once more.

As he laid there, fighting against the suffocating sensation of two guys flattening him into the earth, everything around Squall seemed to turn cold and every sound suddenly became muted. His thoughts were ringing loudly inside his head, and he could feel blood rushing to his ears as his world tilted before him.

How had it ever come to this? What on earth had he done wrong to deserve all this senseless violence?

'_H-how... how did this happen... how...'_

Squall could feel a sense of resignation sinking in as the familiarity of his subdued position struck a chord deep within his tortured psyche. Jeff's intentions were as tragically clear to him as Kato's, and although this situation was much different than the one he was faced with at home, he knew that the end result would be the same. He had been beaten within an inch of unconsciousness, he was outnumbered, at a physical disadvantage, and nobody would be coming to his aid.

There was no hope for him whatsoever.

"... Pull down his pants."

But even so, that didn't mean he was simply going to lay there and take it.

With as much strength as Squall's injured body could muster, the brunette pushed himself upwards, against the weight of his attackers who had attempted to grab a hold of the back of his khakis. Squall had always been much stronger than he looked, and said strength did not fail him now. As he managed to push his attackers off and rolled onto his back, he drove his elbow into Chris' throat and his knee deep into his groin, causing the taller boy to let out a series of yelps as he dropped like a stone onto the ground next to his victim. For just the glimpse of a second, Squall thought that he truly would be able to fight his way out of this one on the count of sheer willpower alone, but the moment he felt the sharp, cool edge of a knife pressed against his jugular, he realized that he had never stood a chance in the first place.

"That's _enough_," Jeff growled darkly into his ear as he kneeled down on Squall's chest and pushed the switchblade he carried on a daily basis further into his victim's flesh. He hadn't drawn blood yet, the gesture thus far merely a threat rather than an actual intent to cut his throat, but Squall seemed to understand that it was only a matter of pushing his luck a little too far, because his stubborn efforts finally ceased.

"Let me tell you something, you little faggot," the black haired youth whispered in quiet rapture, smirking down upon Squall, who was staring back at him out of bruised eyes that looked wide and unfocused. "I've been wanting to do this for a very, _very_ long time. I'm so sick of watching you strut around school every fucking day, thinking you're so high and mighty and untouchable because of your piece of shit father."

Swallowing, Squall pressed, "I-I don—"

"You're not untouchable, princess," Jeff interrupted him with a self-satisfied snarl, his hand that was holding the knife twitching in anticipation. "I'll show you what all I can do to that pretty little body of yours. By the time I'm finished with your ass, you won't know which way is up. Now, whether you still have a pulse or not when I'm done with you isn't very high on my list of priorities right now, so I suggest you be a good little whore and do what I tell you to."

"N-No... no..."

"You can beg all you want, princess, this is going to happen, whether you like it or not. You could have had this the easy way, but you chose to be the cocky, disobedient little fuck that you are. I'm not happy right now, you know that? But that's alright, because I'm about to have plenty of fun with you. And who knows, I might even share you with my buddies here, because I think they deserve some compensation after what you've done to them."

Clenching his teeth, Squall tried to turn his head to the side, but Jeff grabbed his chin with one hand and used the other to run his knife further up the brunette's pale throat, tapping the flat of the blade against the skin.

"So, where were we... ?" Jeff drawled with a nauseating inflection to his voice, his mouth now lowering to Squall's. Almost reverently, the bully dragged his tongue along the curve of the brunette's bottom lip, relishing the fact that Squall tensed and jerked beneath his touch. "Oh, yeah... that's right."

With a snap, Jeff firmed his grasp on Squall's jaw. Then, he gradually retracted his switchblade from the brunette's jugular and demonstratively held it up in front of his captive's sky blue eyes instead, allowing the shiny metal to reflect the light.

"I hope you've learned to behave yourself by now," he purred, the corner of his lips shifting into a smirk as he relished the fright he saw in Squall's expression. "I'd really hate to have to fuck you with _this_. That might do some damage."

With his features curling in disgust, Squall whispered, "Y-you sick piece of... shit..."

The bully only chuckled languidly.

"Trust me, princess, you've seen nothing yet. Nothing at all."

"Why..." Squall suddenly forced out, his trembling words taking an entirely new course, as if trying to reason with the other guy was going to make any kind of difference. "Why... are you doing this... ?"

"Aww, really? C'mon," the bully who was determined to turn rapist chuckled against the other boy's cheek, "What else is a pretty little piece of brunette faggot fluff like you good for, anyway?"

Jeff twisted slightly in his position and gradually let his hand that was holding the knife creep backwards towards Squall's groin area. With a soft, repulsive laugh, the black haired male declared, "You know, I'm _really_ going to enjoy this."

"_**The**_ **FUCK **_**you will**_**!"**

Before Squall's brain had a chance to process what had happened, Jeff's body suddenly went flying off his chest. He could feel the pressure that his other attackers had been holding on his legs yielding abruptly as a dark, solid shadow stepped over him, and then Squall perceived the harsh, dull thudding noises of heavy bodies landing in the snow.

"You motherfucking _CUNTS_!"

For a moment, the brunette didn't understand what was going on. He vaguely recognized the rage-filled voice that was yelling somewhere above him, but he had never heard it sound like that before. Shaking with anxiety and pain, the brunette rolled onto his side and tried to raise his head.

Even he wasn't prepared for what he found.

With large, translucent eyes, Squall stared at the tall blond male with the impressive physique who was beating the seven shades of shit out of Jeff, Chris and Mike. The blond's face showed a primal kind of hatred that was too raw and all-consuming to ever be put into words. He was holding Jeff upright with his left hand, while punching the bully with his right fist until his knuckles split open. Seifer was screaming things that Squall couldn't understand, because his mind was numb with hurt and his ears were ringing loudly. Shaking, he let his gaze roam his immediate proximity. He saw Chris and Mike, who were a party of deformed limbs arranged in the snow, scrambling to get away from their manic attacker. Seifer Almasy had appeared out of nowhere, and he had saved Squall from what had been about to become his worst nightmare yet.

'_Oh... god...'_

As the full magnitude of Jeff's physical and emotional torture hit Squall with the weight of a thousand hammers, the brunette winced and buried his face in one hand. His skin turned ice cold and the hairs on the back of his neck stood as he tried to process what had just happened. There was a shudder that coursed through him when he recalled Jeff's hands defiling his body... when he remembered every cruel thing that had been said. He could still hear Seifer, but even his blond savior's presence barely managed to touch his psyche as the entire, gruesome impact of the abuse struck him.

He'd almost been raped.

He'd almost been raped by Jeff.

He'd almost been raped.

By Jeff.

In front of Rinoa.

In front of Seifer.

Jeff had just tried to _rape_ him.

... And in some sick way, he had succeeded.

Whatever dignity he had left emptied itself into the snow when Squall pushed himself up on his knees and started throwing up. There were streaks of bright red blood, and bits of his rushed Ward's lunch, but Squall didn't even see any of it.

This was much more than he could cope with.

With his breath coming in sharp, gurgling gasps, Squall forced himself into a standing position. Everything inside of the brunette quickly started to shut down, and his reason left him along with his fierce, stupid bravado. He watched Seifer out of burning blue eyes, subconsciously wondering if the blond would be able to hold his own. At this point, however, nobody would have to worry about Seifer Almasy's well-being; the eighteen year old football player was ablaze with a charring kind of rage, consumed by his vengeful desire to pound Squall's torturers into a mass of blood and shame. Squall knew that Seifer might kill them if nobody stopped him, but at this very moment, he didn't care.

He _needed_ to get away.

Squall didn't look back once when he stumbled away from the horrid scene of his own physical, mental and sexual abuse, feeling every grain of sanity slowly unraveling within himself. Back behind the storage building, Seifer was too focused on pouring his hatred and fury into beating the brunette's attackers into the ground to realize that Squall had long fled the area. Only when Jeff, Chris and Mike were no longer able to lift as much as a finger did Seifer pause in his blind, destructive rage. His gaze went flying around the trampled snow that was littered with blood and vomit, looking for Squall where he had left him, but the dark haired boy was no longer there. Rinoa, on the other hand, was huddled against a tree, a little ways off in the distance, shakily clutching the cell phone she had used to call Seifer for help.

"S-Seifer, y-you—"

"Where is he?"

He interrupted her sniffled stammering, not wanting to hear it. He had more important things on his mind. Granted, he owed her some amount of gratitude for alerting him to Squall's dangerous situation, but for some reason, he had the nasty feeling that Rinoa was at least partly to blame for what had happened.

"Where did he go?" the huffing, trembling blond bellowed, gesturing at her with aggressive urgency. There was blood dripping in trails from his knuckles, but he didn't even seem to notice. Rinoa watched him with eyes the size of dinner plates, and she flinched every time he moved.

"He... I..."

"_Where, _Rinoa?"

The tears rolling down her face did nothing to appease him. He didn't have time for this. The dumb, pitiful girl was only holding him up, keeping him from finding the one person who truly mattered to him. Finally, when the last bit of his patience with her had already drained away, she sobbed, "T-The parking lot... I think... I think he went towards the parking lot."

Saying nothing further, Seifer whipped around and ran as fast as he could. The mere thought of Squall attempting to drive in his current condition was making him sick. Images of the brutally assaulted brunette flashed in his mind, burning themselves into the blank canvas of his memory forever, and Seifer winced inwardly as he picked up his pace.

'_I need to find him. I need to find him before it's too late.'_

As he sprinted towards the parking lot, Seifer noticed random, errant specks of red here and there in the bright white snow. He followed them, as well as the footprints that accompanied that tell-tale trail of blood, knowing that they had to belong to Squall.

'_Fuck, where is he? Where? I can't see him anywhere. Shit. Shit. Shit.'_

Seifer reached the general vicinity where he believed Squall had parked his mother's car, but the brunette or the black Mercedes were nowhere to be found. Not knowing what else to do, Seifer yanked his cellphone out of his pocket and speed-dialed his injured brunette friend, but his call went straight to voicemail.

"Shit! Fuck! Shit!"

Impatiently, Seifer cussed up a storm as he paced circles in the parking lot and waited for the 'beep' of Squall's answering service.

"Squall, this is Seifer! Call me! I'm fuckin' worried about you! Where are you? Are you still at school? Where did you go? Please tell me where you are! Call me back, you hear me? Call me!"

After he hung up, Seifer's mind immediately changed gears and he dialed the number of the first person who popped into his head.

"_... Hello?"_

"Laguna!"

"_Oh. Seifer? Hey. What's the matter...? Are you alright?"_

"No, I need your help! I need to find Squall!"

"_What? Squall? But... shouldn't he be in school?"_

"No," Seifer growled impatiently, now jogging towards his own pickup truck. His gaze continued to fly in all directions, searching the area for a sign of his friend, but for some reason he already knew that Squall was no longer there. "Something happened. He got beat up by these guys at school, and... fuck, it's bad. It's really bad. I... fuck... I think they tried to rape him, and—"

"_What? **What** did you just say? Did you say they tried to __**rape**__ him? You can't be serious!"_

"I wouldn't fuckin' _joke_ about this, believe me! I... I think I got there in time, but... either way, he's hurt. He ran off while I was fuckin' up the guys that did this to him, and now I don't know where he is! He's not answering his phone. He could be anywhere. He's got Raine's car."

"_Do you have any idea where he went? Any idea at all?"_

"No, but he looked like shit, I don't think he went home. He'd never let his mother see him like that. But I don't know. I don't know how far he'll get in his current condition. I was thinking maybe the park."

"_Okay, I'll go take a look there, I'm right around the corner. I was just at the lake. Seifer, if you hear __**anything**__, call me immediately! If it's as bad as you say, we need to find him and get him to a hospital."_

"I know. Fuck, I know."

"_Where else could he be? What do you think?"_

"I don't know," Seifer groaned in frustration, burying his face in the palm of his hand. "I have no idea. He didn't look like he'd be able to do much rational thinking right now but... he always seems to go to the park whenever he's in trouble."

"_Alright... Are you coming out this way?"_

"Yeah," the blond affirmed as he jumped into his truck and revved up the engine. "I'll be there shortly."

"_Okay. I'll see what I can find. Call me as soon as you get here!"_

"Okay."

While Seifer was breaking land speed records on his way to Perkins Park, Squall's safe haven of choice, Laguna Loire whipped his own car around and headed back to the parking lot he had just left less than a minute ago. He had spent a few quiet hours at the lake, reminiscing about his emotional meeting with Squall and his mother. He was still shell-shocked by the dramatic twist his life had taken during this random visit to Deling City, but despite the difficulties and the heartache, he'd been grateful that things had turned out the way they had. Right now, however, he had no time to think about the past and wonder what had gone right and what had gone wrong.

Right now, he had to find his son.

The moment Laguna had backed his vehicle into an empty spot, his attention was grabbed by a black sedan reeling into the parking lot with squealing tires that barely seemed to have any grip in the snow. The car came to a skidding halt not far from Laguna, and when he saw the driver getting out, stumbling a few, hectic paces and dropping to the ground, the journalist from Esthar realized with a start that, for once, luck was on his side.

"Squall!"

The tall, dark haired man jumped out of his own vehicle and ran towards the black Mercedes. When he got a closer look at the driver, who was desperately trying to get back on his feet, a deep, piercing spike of panic settled in the center of Laguna's heart.

"... Oh, my God."

Laguna had witnessed many gut-wrenching things throughout the decades of his career as a soldier and a journalist, but nothing even compared to seeing his son there on his knees in front of him, his mangled hands wrestling the side of the car for leverage as he fought tooth and nail to stand. The only color in Squall's ashen white face was that of scarlet red splashed down his once-perfect features, and a painful mixture of black and blue, stamped into his bloodless complexion. His lip and cheekbone were swollen, and he had several cuts above his brow level. His formerly unblemished skin had been scored forcefully by someone's intent to cause him harm, and lots of it. Laguna noted the blood running down the teenager's arms and hands with alarm, and when he saw the disheveled state of Squall's pants, thermal shirt and jacket, he remembered Seifer's unsettling words from only minutes before.

_::They tried to rape him.::_

The journalist's heart broke for his teenage son as the realization of what had happened to Squall sank in, and although Laguna had only explicitly touched the boy perhaps once or twice so far, the urge to hold him suddenly became near unbearable. He could tell by the vacated expression on Squall's face that the brunette was barely aware of his surroundings, and his mind was in a much darker, distant place.

"Squall," Laguna uttered the teenager's name as he rushed closer, prepared to scoop him into his arms and take him to safety, wherever that might be. Squall, however, only stunned back against the car as he finally succeeded in dragging himself upwards, and he stared at Laguna with a hunted look in his eyes.

"N-No," he stammered, breathless in his disbelief. "G-get away!"

Ignoring his child's irrational response, the older, long haired man grabbed him, offering what he believed to be protection and support, but Squall fought against his embrace, clawing his hands into his dark blue button down shirt and his coat, both pushing and pulling at the same time.

"Let go," the boy ordered, his voice strident and off pitch. "L-Let go! Let go!"

Laguna, not wanting to crowd his son against his will after what had been done to him, loosened his grasp considerably. To his surprise, however, Squall continued to wrench his fingers firmly into Laguna's clothing, holding on as tightly as he possibly could. His eyes were fixed and unfocused, staring right through his father as if he wasn't even there.

"Let go..." Squall continued to order shakily. "Let go..."

"Squall," the journalist said gently as he placed one soothing palm on the nape of the boy's neck and cocked his head down towards him. "You're the one who's holding onto _me_."

Squall immediately quit rambling, and he stopped moving when he realized that the man in front of him was speaking the truth. Suddenly, he jerked his hands back as if he'd been struck by a surge of electricity, before spinning out of Laguna's reach and heading in the opposite direction, towards the exit of the parking lot.

"B-But... Squall, wait!" his father bellowed, immediately taking chase. He made a vain attempt at grabbing Squall's shoulder, but the youth only shrugged him off frantically and continued to head towards the crowded street.

"Squall, stop! Listen to me, you—"

"No!" the seventeen year old yelled, throwing his fists up against his forehead as he ran. "No!"

"Stop running! You're hurt! Squall, you're _hurt_!"

"Get away from me!"

The constant noise within the walls of Squall's mind became louder, his father's voice fainter. There was no place in his tortured psyche for rational thinking or careful consideration right now. He didn't know where he was going or what he was doing, but he knew that he needed to get away from everyone and everything, even if he'd have to _crawl_ his way to that imaginary place of solitude he was seeking.

"Squall, wait! Watch the road!"

There was a thump of panic in the back of Laguna's head when he followed the disturbed brunette boy towards the busy four lane road beside the park. The snow had been plowed there and replaced with salt. Traffic was heavy and moving fast, and before the journalist from Esthar had a chance to interfere, Squall had stumbled out into the street.

"Wait! **WAIT**!"

The next few seconds passed in a wild blur of emotions and actions, too fast to even latch into Laguna's memory. He remembered seeing Squall, and he remembered seeing the bright blue semi-truck.

All he really knew was that he had to come between the two.

There were tires, screaming to a stop, an anxious cluster of earsplitting sounds as drivers blew their horns in alarm, and a sharp, ripping pain in the lower half of his leg. His body thudded into Squall's and they remained in motion for a while, until they came to a halt in a tangled mess of limbs somewhere on the asphalt.

For a very long moment, Laguna didn't hear, see or feel anything. In fact, he believed that he was asleep, having a dreamless kind of nap, and he was quite disappointed when he suddenly registered movement and noise all around him.

'_What the...'_

Of course, as the sensations came surging back to him, so did the pain. His leg felt heavy, on fire, nearly disconnected from the rest of his body. With that unsettling impression now forcefully dominating his jumbled thought process, Laguna awkwardly attempted to sit up and cast a curious look at his own leg.

'_Oh... it's still there... That's good. But... where is...'_

When his mind finally managed to make some sense of the conundrum of colors around him, Laguna anxiously tried to find his son's face. He didn't succeed until he turned around in helpless confusion, and he found a set of startling blue eyes staring at him – eyes that looked so much like Raine's.

'_Squall...'_

The boy was sitting behind him, in the middle of the road, his father's upper body draped across his thighs. Squall's right arm and hand were clutching his chest, somewhere above the heart. The dark haired teenager was shaking – even Laguna could tell in his numbed up state – but Squall's face was completely frozen, and his eyes registered no emotion whatsoever.

"H-Hey..." the injured journalist muttered, attempting a smile that turned into more of a cringe. "Are you okay...?"

Squall continued to just breathe heavily, in and out, and quite honestly, Laguna was alright with that. The boy didn't need to say or do anything, he just needed to be there. He needed to _exist_.

'_He's alive... that's all that matters...'_

Laguna sighed and closed his eyes for a minute, deciding that there was enough talking being done around them; random voices, screaming for an ambulance or gushing words of accusation, defense and concern. Laguna knew that something wasn't right, but the exact circumstances eluded him right now.

"Your leg..."

Finally, a voice that Laguna recognized. It was interlaced with hurt, and that worried the man more than anything. He lifted his gaze to his son's face once more, noticing how the boy's arm clutched him more tightly in return.

'_Ah... that.'_

Laguna looked down in response once more, watching with interest how multiple bystanders had bent over his lower extremities, carefully examining what they found there. The journalist could tell that there was something decidedly wrong with the angle of his lower leg, and when he tilted his head to get a better look, he realized that he also had an impressive laceration about midway down his shin.

"Oh. That... explains... a few things..." Laguna said with a ghostly chuckle, wincing at the excruciating pain that shot up his left leg into his spinal cord.

"Don't move..." the boy behind him whispered, his voice awed, scared and broken, his handsome features paralyzed with a kind of panic that ran deep beneath the surface.

"It's alright..." Laguna tried to reassure him, now placing his own hand over Squall's smaller one, feeling the crusted blood and rough skin tears beneath. "I've had... worse..."

So it was a lie, sure, but all in all the dark haired man knew perfectly well that this scenario could have ended on a much more deadly note. He was still alive, breathing, and so was the boy he had deliberately risked his life for. Somehow, he had managed to push Squall out of the way of the approaching truck, and he considered that obvious success well worth a few likely broken bones. Because in the end, when everything was said and done, that seemingly random callous brunette boy was his _son_, his own flesh and blood, and he looked more like him than Laguna had figured any child of his ever would. He was more precious to Laguna than any piece of skin or bone ever would be. It didn't matter how long they'd known each other or whether the kid accepted him as his father or not – it only mattered that their story was far from over, regardless of the cost.

'_We still... have time...'_

The shocked boy who was holding him swallowed dryly when he saw the journalist closing his eyes with a tired sigh. There was so much commotion around them, but Squall seemed unaware of all of it. The people that questioned him, prodded at him and touched his face as if to get a better look at his injuries barely even fazed him.

He didn't understand.

Honestly, he had no clue how he had ended up in the middle of the road outside Perkins Park, but for some reason, he knew that he would likely be dead if it hadn't been for Laguna pushing him to the ground. The man had jeopardized his own life and health for his sake, and none of it made any sense to the brunette.

'_He barely... even knows me...'_

Squall had seen the ghastly injury to the man's leg – knew how much the reporter had to be hurting. Yet Laguna just laid there, calmly even, only moving occasionally here and there to smile up at him encouragingly.

'_You... idiot...'_

As he sat there on the cold asphalt, refusing to allow anyone to move him or Laguna, he didn't even feel the tears that burnt his eyes and ran down his bruised cheeks. Some darker part of him wanted to scream and push everyone around them away, but he endured their presence as much as he would have endured a rainstorm. He just let it wash over him, hoping it would pass eventually.

And it did – it all faded into nothingness the very moment he felt strong, familiar arms engulfing him tightly, allowing him to finally come undone.

"Squall! _Holy shit_, Squall!"

The brunette's gaze turned, finding eyes of startling viridian green boring into his own silver blue ones, gleaming with relief and apprehension at the very same time. He knew who he was looking at; it was the only guy Squall had ever trusted – the only guy who had ever mattered, until now. Seifer smelled of salt and rage and vehemence as he was clutching Squall against his chest, and he was rambling things that the brunette couldn't have understood if he had tried.

None of it even touched his conscience right now.

"... Help me."

Seifer stared at his treasured friend as he knelt beside him in the street, stunned into silence by the boy's unexpected, deeply touching request. At first, he didn't know what Squall meant – not until the brunette suddenly turned his face towards Laguna, who was surveying both of them out of eyes that had been clouded with pain. When Squall's hands wrenched into the man's shirt, wrestling it for some kind of answer, Seifer realized that the boy was far from asking for assistance for himself, regardless of how badly he was injured.

This wasn't about him at all. He wanted to help his father, and he didn't know what to do.

Seifer could feel himself choking up at the heartbreaking plea from the reclusive boy who so rarely showed emotion, and who had never asked for anything.

"Don't worry. They said an ambulance is on the way," the blond attempted to reassure him, now changing his focus to the older male as well. "Hey, Laguna. How are you holding up?"

The journalist regarded him with a weirdly serene, almost amused looking smile, which caused Seifer to cock a brow.

"Couldn't... be better," Laguna announced with astounding confidence.

"Did he hit his head?" the blond asked skeptically as he surveyed the older man, who seemed like he was a few cards short of a full deck.

Scowling at his eerily content looking father, Squall answered, "... Probably."

"What happened? Are you alright? Did you get hit, too?"

"No," Squall said as he shook his head, and his eyes became dark. "He... jumped between me... and the truck."

"Wait... he _what_? Are you serious? Holy _shit_," Seifer whistled hoarsely as his gaze flew from Squall to Laguna. The man's leg was decidedly painful to look at, but judging by the daunting size of that semi-truck parked sideways next to them, both males could have very well been flattened into the asphalt.

Not knowing what else to do, Seifer stood up and walked around the two to squat by Laguna's hip. He noted that someone had tied a belt around the reporter's thigh, apparently in the attempt to produce a makeshift tourniquet. Men and women alike were still fluttering all around them, and the rest of traffic eased by only slowly. Then, finally, somewhere in the distance, Seifer could make out the constant wail of a siren.

"That should be the ambulance," Seifer remarked hopefully, now sitting down next to Squall. With a worried crease between his brows, the blond examined his friend's wounds, but Squall would barely acknowledge his efforts.

"They beat the shit out of you," the eighteen year old murmured softly as he dragged his fingertips across Squall's left cheekbone, eliciting a reflexive twitch.

"I'm fine," Squall deadpanned in a low, disjointed voice, and Seifer didn't object. The horrors of everything that had happened clearly reflected on the boy's face, and they rattled deep within Seifer's heart.

Still, at the end of the day, they were here, together, and that was more than he had dared to hope for.

While Seifer hovered by his friend's side in a protective sort of way, he watched how the large, red and white colored ambulance from Deling City General Hospital came to a halt close by. Two males in EMT uniforms quickly hurried towards their position, gear, gurney and all in tow. Quietly, Seifer breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that Laguna and Squall would be well taken care of.

Of course, he should have figured that things wouldn't progress nearly as smoothly as he'd hoped.

* * *

"Why the hell didn't you let them take you?"

Seifer tossed his friend a furious glare from the side as they were driving down the road in his pickup truck, but instead of answering, Squall only pressed the ice pack he'd been holding more tightly against his cheek. He looked miserable, sitting there in the passenger seat in his own blood and suffering, but despite his injuries and sapped strength he had managed to throw a remarkable tantrum only minutes earlier when the paramedics had attempted to take the brunette to the hospital.

"Seriously," Seifer insisted, looking almost annoyed as he studied the back of the ambulance in front of them. "What's the deal?"

Slanting his head away from him, Squall simply stared out the passenger window. By the time he finally answered, Seifer had no longer expected a response.

"... I don't like ambulances."

"Really. You know, I don't think they're very high on anyone's list of favorites, Squall," the blond snorted, the cynicism in his voice a bit sharper than intended.

"You're taking me," the brunette muttered persistently, sounding exhausted now as he blew out a breath and shifted in his seat. Various emotions flitted across his cryptic face, but he didn't bother to elaborate on any of them. "There was... no need to go with them."

"Considering you look like you might pass out any given minute, I think there was."

"... I'm fine."

"Of course you are," the blond snapped aggressively, anger branding each syllable, because his patience was running thin after their traumatizing afternoon. "You're always fine. You're the very _definition_ of fine, aren't you? If you were any finer I'd throw you a fuckin' funeral. Fuck, Squall."

The dark haired youth continued to avoid his eyes as he glared unblinkingly ahead, chewing on his bottom lip and not saying a word in response. His mind seemed to be elsewhere, and Seifer realized that it was pointless to attempt reasoning with him. At this point, he was simply glad that the brunette had agreed to go to the hospital at all. Of course, Squall was concerned about Laguna's health more so than his own, and whether he'd actually allow any of the staff at the Emergency Room to tend to him was a different story altogether, but for the moment being, Seifer had to be satisfied.

It really wasn't like he had another choice.

"I've been... in a helicopter," Squall's hoarse voice suddenly ripped through the heavy silence that lingered between them, and Seifer's gaze flitted over to his face.

"What?" he asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.

"When my sister and I... after we got lost in the snow storm... we got airlifted to Trabia Hospital," the brunette explained slowly, his reluctance to relive the memory evident in the way he tensed up as he spoke. "I was unconscious for most of the trip... but I remember some of it. They took good care of me... but... I hated every single minute of it. I felt... alone... and helpless the entire time. It scared me. I wanted to get out, and be with my sister... and I couldn't. It was... one of the worst experiences of my life. I can't... do that again. I can't."

Seifer stared, and for a moment, he was at a loss for words. Truthfully, he hadn't even considered the possibility that Squall had some sort of profound reason for his dislike of ambulances.

Admittedly, he suddenly felt like an asshole.

"I understand," he replied simply. "I'm sorry. Thank you for telling me. I mean it."

"Yeah," Squall murmured, looking uncomfortable. "Whatever."

"I'll get you there, I promise," the blond assured him, smiling now as he gently ruffled Squall's wet, sticky hair. "And you're not alone this time."

Deep down, Seifer was grateful for his friend's honesty, and even more so for the fact that Squall obviously trusted him enough to let him accompany him and his father to the hospital. Knowing Squall, Seifer wouldn't have been one bit surprised if the brunette had insisted on driving himself to the ER, but luckily, he had done nothing of that sort. In some way, Seifer realized that the dark haired boy was only complying because he was hurting too much to offer any noteworthy resistance, but that was alright too.

At this point, he no longer cared how things got done.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, they arrived at the Emergency Room of Deling City General Hospital. Seifer parked quickly somewhere by the entrance and helped his friend out of the truck. Squall was unsteady on his feet, but at least he seemed much more mentally stable than he had initially after Jeff's attack on him. Seifer wanted to ask him what exactly had happened, and how far precisely Jeff had come in his attempt at sexually assaulting him, but he figured that those wounds were better left untouched right now. The boy was preoccupied with his worries about his father, and although he wouldn't say how concerned he really was, it clearly showed on his face when Seifer helped him to the ambulance.

'_He pretends he doesn't care, and I don't really blame him after everything he went through... but that guy saved his life, and he paid for it in blood. No matter how you look at it, Laguna's more of a fuckin' father than mine will ever be.'_

Seifer hastily pushed that notion aside, knowing that there was no room in his crowded mind at the moment to allow for bitterness towards his own parents. This day was already chaotic enough without that particular issue to add to the growing pile of emotional debris.

'_This isn't about me right now.'_

He watched how the dark haired boy drifted to the side of the bright yellow gurney that currently hosted his father. Laguna was awake and looked remarkably better than he had back at the scene of the accident. The paramedics had carefully wrapped his leg, and judging by the spacy glow in the man's eyes, he also had some choice pain medications on board.

"Heeey, kiddo," the reporter greeted his son happily, lifting his lips into a half-smirk. For a bizarre moment, Seifer almost expected the man to try and high-five Squall, who was glaring at his father suspiciously. "How are you?"

Squall ignored the man's medicine-induced cheerfulness and silently followed the stretcher as it was being wheeled inside the hospital. His bloody right hand was squeezing the side rail of the gurney tightly, even when Laguna gently patted his forearm, as if allowing him to let go. One of the paramedics was watching Squall with particular intensity as the boy was struggling to keep up and stay by his father's side, before he suddenly clicked his tongue and caught Seifer's eye.

"He _needs_ to be seen," the redheaded young man muttered under his breath. "If nothing else, he'll probably need a couple stitches and a Tetanus shot. Either way, he certainly doesn't need to be walking around right now. He doesn't look good."

"I know," Seifer responded in a quiet voice. "I'll take care of it."

As they stopped in a random hallway to await their room assignment from one of the ER charge nurses, Seifer could tell that his friend wasn't going to last much longer. Squall's face had taken on a noticeably green tint, and his forehead had started to bead with sweat. Still, he stubbornly continued to latch on to the gurney and stood watch over his father. Unsure of what had to be done in order to get Squall the care that he needed (and against his will, if absolutely necessary), Seifer nudged the redheaded, spiky-haired paramedic in the side, while performing a quick jerking movement towards Squall with his chin. The medic took one glance at the pale brunette in response, before promptly turning around and walking towards a skinny black haired male in green scrubs, who seemed to be scribbling notes on a clipboard. They talked quietly amongst each other for a minute, before rejoining the others. Seifer watched how the new arrival circled the gurney to take a quick peek at Laguna, before turning his focus to Squall.

"My name is Dr. Odine," the man introduced himself to the teenager, his voice heavy with a German accent. "I'm a physician here at the ER. Your name is Squall, is that right?"

The brunette's gaze flickered towards the diminutively statured doctor briefly, before he forced out a nod and returned his attention back to his father, or more specifically, his father's leg. Obviously, he wasn't in the mood for formalities.

"We're going to take your father over to one of the trauma rooms, where we can do x-rays at his bedside. One of my colleagues, Dr. Cid, is going to take good care of him," the doctor explained calmly, while roving Squall's body with his attentive grey eyes. "Meanwhile, let's get _you_ into one of my rooms and get you looked at."

"I'm fine," Squall gave his generic, evasive retort, although his ashen face clearly belied his words.

"I'm sure you are, but be that as it may, you still need to be checked out. Besides, it'll be much easier for us to take care of your father while we don't have to worry about you falling over," Dr. Odine replied pragmatically, and even Squall did not seem to have a suitable response to that.

"Trust me, it's for your own good," the man added encouragingly.

"I don't _want_... to be seen," the brunette boy continued to insist, and his edgy attitude caused Dr. Odine to regard him with a long, meticulous look.

"... How old are you?" the man asked with a curious undertone, now shifting one hand onto his hip.

"Old enough," Squall shot back abrasively.

"He's seventeen," the tall, red haired paramedic elaborated willingly, earning himself a charring sideways glare from his younger patient. "His father allowed him to refuse transport by ambulance, but the kid agreed to be evaluated at the hospital. He just insisted to go by car."

"I'm fine," Squall repeated stubbornly, looking almost annoyed now. "I feel better already."

"The fuck you do," Seifer growled impatiently, narrowing his eyes at his hardheaded friend as he got fed up with the brunette's excuses. "Cut the crap, Squall."

With a sigh, the doctor stepped up to the gurney once more and tilted his head towards Laguna, who seemed blissfully oblivious to the hospital staff's struggle.

"Sir," Dr. Odine addressed the man politely, while motioning towards Squall, who was still lingering by his father's side. "Would you like your son to be medically evaluated?"

"Why, of course! Absolutely! Splendid idea!" Laguna replied blithely and without deliberation, causing Squall to let out a snort of indignation.

"He doesn't have the right... to make decisions like that..." the boy interjected grittily.

"Is he your father, or is he not?" the doctor asked, although the question seemed purely rhetorical to him. He found the physical resemblance between his two patients quite uncanny.

Seifer watched with interest how Squall first blinked at Laguna, then dropped his gaze to the man's damaged leg. He remained still for a very long time, alone with the voices inside his head and the harrowing memories of Laguna laying bleeding in his arms in the middle of some Deling City roadway. Squall might have been stubborn, naïve and vindictive at times, but he had to admit to himself that his father wouldn't be injured right now if it hadn't been for his sake, and that realization burnt a hole in his heart that was the size of Galbadia. A desperate, childish part of him wanted to feel resentful towards the man he had spent seventeen years rejecting, but for some reason, it was no longer that simple. As bitter as he still was and as foreign as that man yet felt to him, he couldn't with a clear conscience deny the familiar bond that Laguna had already proven to him today by risking his life for his own.

And thus, Squall very slowly removed his hands from the rail of the stretcher with a sharp gleam of guilt in his eyes.

"... He is."

Even Seifer couldn't help but raise a brow at his friend's unexpected change in demeanor. There was a certain kind of sad acquiescence that he could see in Squall's features, and he really didn't like it. He had figured out by now that Squall took too much responsibility for everything that ever happened to the people around him, and that the boy blamed himself for things he never had the power to change in the first place.

'_You're way too hard on yourself. This wasn't your fault. I wish you'd quit beating yourself up like this.'_

Nevertheless, Seifer considered it a positive thing that Squall would publically acknowledge Laguna as his father, even though the journalist looked high as a kite and probably would remember none of it once the medications wore off.

'_Still, it's an improvement. I just wish the circumstances were different.'_

"Very well, then," Dr. Odine acknowledged with a satisfied nod, before motioning towards the paramedics to move along before the boy could possibly decide to change his mind. "Don't worry, he's in good hands."

Squall focused on some point on the smoke grey linoleum by his feet and chose not to answer. Deep down, he was wondering what he had just agreed to, but at the end of the day, he was painfully aware that he was too young to legally turn down the doctor's assistance, anyway. The thought angered him, because he had considered himself a man for years, but he was hardly going to argue the reasons why.

'_Let's just get this over with.'_

"We'll get you in this room right here," Dr. Odine announced as he pointed at the nearest open door.

Without hesitating as much as a second, Squall staggered over to the exam room that the doctor had appointed to him. Seifer followed him with only inches to spare, suppressing the urge to simply throw the brunette over his shoulder and carry him to the bed that was arranged at one end of the small room. Each one of Squall's movements was translating to utter exhaustion as he fought for every single step, until he finally came to rest at the edge of the hospital bed mattress where he sank down with a subdued sigh.

"Are you alright?" Seifer asked as he stood next to his friend, who sat there gasping for air for a little while, before finally twisting his gaze upwards. The blond was surprised to see a small, grim smile etched into the corner of Squall's lips, and somehow, the brunette managed to look invincible despite the cuts and bruises that littered his skin.

"... Don't ask... and I won't have to lie."

Perhaps Squall's words made sense. Perhaps they didn't. They stirred Seifer's soul all the same as he silently took a seat on the bed beside Squall, and when he hugged the boy to his chest, he came to realize that it really didn't make a difference whether the boy was alright or not. Perhaps it had always been a stupid thing to ask.

Because when everything was said and done, Squall _would _be alright.

Seifer was going to make sure of that, even if it would take him a lifetime to accomplish.

* * *

There was a light, bright as a burning star, hovering somewhere past the sea of darkness right in front of him. He didn't understand what was going on exactly, and that thought unsettled him at least for a little while. Still, part of him realized that it wasn't the stereotypical 'light at the end of the tunnel' he was looking at, if only because he'd always figured that the state of being, well, _dead_, came with the privilege of being entirely pain free.

Laguna Loire, on the other hand, was hurting like a son of a bitch, thank you very much.

With a disapproving groan, the reporter forced himself to open his eyes and unwillingly confronted this uncomfortable thing known as reality. He very much wanted to pretend that he knew exactly where he was, but frankly, he had no clue. Fortunately, he'd never been the type to be easily unsettled, but at the same time, Laguna had never exactly made it a habit to engage in activities that could involve him waking up in a strange room, either. Therefore, he felt at least slightly on edge as his consciousness gradually chased away the shadows of his deep, comatose sleep. Finally, when the silhouettes around him took proper shape, Laguna found that he was tucked into a bed in a very dimly lit room, which he considered a fairly promising start, if nothing else.

'_Where... am I...?'_

Grimacing as he pushed himself upwards to take a better look around, Laguna's foggy gaze initially fell on a surgical table stacked with medical equipment and other random oddities he couldn't immediately distinguish. He really didn't understand what was going on, and when he finally noticed that he wasn't alone in the room, things started to make even less sense than before.

Laguna blinked a few times as his green-blue eyes studied the sleeping brunette teenager curled up in an armchair by the left side of his bed. There was a strange, intuitive fondness that promptly flooded the man's heart upon the sight of that young man, as well as a stitch of sadness when he noticed the bruises, gauze, medical tape and butterfly bandages that were scattered across the kid's body.

'_... Squall.'_

With some minimal effort, Laguna managed to sit up in the bed and leaned with his back against the headrest, all the while never taking his eyes off the dark haired youth. As Laguna was sliding around, he noticed that his left leg had been elevated on some pillows, and while it hurt to a certain degree, it certainly wasn't his main focus right now. With his hands resting on the stark white sheet in his lap, Laguna simply sat there, gazing at one of the very select few human beings he had ever truly cared for. Logically, it might not have seemed very reasonable that the slim, pale brunette boy meant as much to him as he did, but biologically and psychologically, everything made perfect sense - at least to Laguna.

'_He's mine. My flesh and blood. I've never had anything that even remotely compares to that.'_

A soft smile leaked across the dark haired reporter's face as he tilted his head and watched his son sleeping. It wasn't something he had ever had the privilege to enjoy, and he figured that another opportunity would likely not present itself again very soon. Admittedly, the boy looked far from comfortable. He was wearing dirty khaki pants, unlaced boots and a blue hospital scrub top that was too large on his body. Someone had covered him with a blanket, which was threatening to slide off his shoulders as he was contorted in the chair like a pretzel.

'_How long has he been sitting there...? How long have __**I **__been laying here?'_

Confused, Laguna lifted up his right hand, which had an IV catheter attached to it and a line with some clear, unknown fluid running through it. He vaguely remembered the incident by the park – how he had practically flung himself between Squall and the approaching truck – but every memory after that was fuzzy at best. He had injured his leg during his attempt at saving the brunette boy's life, and when Laguna curiously shifted his sheet to the side to take better measure of the damage he'd done, he noted that his leg was up to his knee in a starch white cast.

'_Well. That's certainly inconvenient.'_

With a long sigh, Laguna redirected his attention to his son once more, who was still sound asleep. Honestly, seeing the boy relatively healthy made any discomfort related to his injury vanish within seconds. He truly enjoyed that budding sense of parental adoration that had been growing steadily within his heart – he'd never thought that being a father would feel so naturally calming and fulfilling to him. Sure, his son was seventeen years old, far from some pink bundle of joy wrapped in blue baby blankets and the scent of a newborn, but essentially, to Laguna, the boy was exactly _that_.

The overwhelming feeling of a new father's pride he experienced, at least, was the same.

As the man with the dark ponytail gazed upon his child with unmasked awe on his face, a flash of silver resting against Squall's subtly heaving chest suddenly caught his interest. From a distance, the reporter could only make out that the boy was wearing a heavy necklace with some kind of pendant. When he leaned a bit closer, he noticed that its shape was that of a roaring lion's head, set upon the bottom half of a cross.

'_A lion... that's unexpected. I wonder if Raine ever told him...?'_

Ignoring the intravenous line he was hooked up to, Laguna scooted further towards the edge of the bed and reached out to the boy who was sitting almost within grasp. Before he had a chance to take a closer look at Squall's jewelry, however, the door to his hospital room suddenly opened quietly, admitting a cone of bright LED light and a tall, athletically built male.

'_Oh...'_

Stepping inside, while carrying a styrofoam coffee cup in one bandaged right hand, was Seifer, Squall's ever protective brawny boyfriend. The teenager closed the door behind himself almost soundlessly, and he didn't realize that Laguna was wide awake until he had already crossed the room to set his cup down on a table arranged in a distant corner, away from the reporter's bed.

"Hey!" the blond youth greeted him in surprise when his eyes caught Laguna's, but he kept his voice low. "You're awake. How're you doin'?"

Seifer walked up the right side of his bed, placing one arm loosely against the headrest as he leaned closer in order to prevent from having to talk too loudly.

"Not too bad," Laguna replied lightly as he glanced up at the teen. "Say, where are we, anyway?"

"Oh. Galbadia General Hospital. They moved you from the ER up here to a floor after your surgery."

"Surgery?" Laguna asked, raising his brows. "Surgery on what?"

"Your _leg_," the blond explained, giving Laguna a peculiar look. "Honestly, you have no idea what's going on, do you?"

"Well, no, but as long as I got to keep all my body parts, it can't be that bad, can it?" the reporter replied with a hopeful grimace, before hesitating. "I _did_ get to keep all my body parts, didn't I...?"

"I can't say I've checked, but as far as I know, yeah," the teenager chuckled. "You broke your lower leg. I think they called it your tibia, whatever that is. They realigned the bone during surgery. Anyway, they said everything went well, but I'm not a doctor or anything."

Scratching his temple in confusion, Laguna inquired, "When was that?"

"The surgery? Earlier today. It's about 9pm now."

"Oh," Laguna acknowledged. "That's not too bad."

"No," Seifer agreed. "And by the way, they had you on some pretty heavy duty pain medications after the accident. I'm not surprised you don't remember much."

"Oh really?" the man asked curiously. "Was I acting crazy or anything?"

"... Kind of."

Laguna accredited Seifer's amused expression with a sigh and said, "Well, at least I must have been entertaining."

"You could say that," the blond teen grinned. "Anyway, you want me to call the doctor so you can talk to him?"

"Not yet," the reporter said, shaking his head, before his gaze suddenly drifted back over to his sleeping teenage son and his voice became gentle. "... How is he doing?"

Seifer seemed to choose his answer very carefully before he finally replied with a stern expression, "As well as he could be, I guess. Physically, they said, he's doing alright. He was lucky. Some cuts, tons of bruises, a spleen contusion and a couple stitches over his right temple. Nothing major though, fortunately. He wouldn't let them stitch up the cut between his eyes and the one over his left brow, so they'll probably scar. He doesn't seem to care, though. He also lost quite a bit of blood and was a little unsteady for a while, so they gave him some IV fluids 'til he felt better. They haven't released him yet because a parent needs to sign for him, and he's refused to call his mother."

"What? She doesn't know?"

"No. Honestly, I'm not sure what he's trying to accomplish. I mean... it's not like he can _hide_ what they did to him," Seifer growled under his breath, a flash of bloodlust in his virulent green eyes. "Anyway, I guess he wants you to sign. I'm eighteen, so I can take him home whenever he's getting released. But, yeah... that's where we're at right now with him."

"Okay..." Laguna drawled, looking thoughtful. Finally, his expression darkened. He could feel an aching in the pit of his stomach when his gaze roamed his son's body. He wasn't so sure he wanted to know the answer to the question he was about to ask, but he realized that he did not have another choice. "Seifer. You said that... I mean, when you called me, you know... He... uh. Did... did the guys who assaulted him really try to... rape him?"

"Yeah," the blond said with a small snarl, and his face suddenly lost any trace of kindness. "Honestly, I don't know what exactly happened. The girl who called me and told me what was going on said that Squall was about to be raped. I tried to get there as fast as I could. It didn't take me but a few minutes. When I got there, he was on the ground and one guy was sitting on top of him with a knife. The other two were holding Squall down. He was fully clothed, so... I honestly have no idea what they managed to do aside from beating the shit out of him. Hopefully nothing, but he refuses to talk about it. I spoke to his doctor and told him what I knew, but the moment they even _mentioned_ a rape kit to Squall, he completely flipped the fuck out. I mean, he went fuckin' ballistic, I'm not even kidding. He even threw his bedpan at the doctor. It was empty, ya know, but he got his point across. Needless to say, they dropped _that_ idea pretty quickly."

"I see..." the man responded with a hard look in his eyes. The idea of his son, or anybody, for that matter, having to endure any kind of physical or sexual abuse brought his normally calm blood to a boil, and there was a sort of primal, violent hatred growing in his heart he had never experienced before.

"Do you want me to wake him up?" the blond offered.

"No," the dark haired reporter said firmly as he shook his head. "Let him sleep. He looks terrible."

"He's been sitting there since 5pm, when you got out of surgery," Seifer explained as he quietly walked over to the other side of the bed, where Squall was sitting. Carefully, the blond adjusted the position of Squall's blanket on his body, eliciting merely a small sound and a barely noticeable twitch of muscle from the boy. "He passed out maybe an hour ago. He's been completely exhausted."

"I'm not surprised."

"They... found the scars on his wrists," the blond teenager added, sounding hesitant now as he looked down upon his sleeping friend. The brunette's lower forearms and hands had been wrapped with gauze, as much as he had tolerated, anyway. "He tried to play it off, but some of them are pretty recent. They're probably going to talk to you about that."

"... Does his mother know that he cuts himself?" Laguna asked in a flattened tone of voice, his face unreadable.

"No. As far as I'm aware, only you and I do."

Seifer watched the man's face closely, noticing that Laguna seemed to be having some kind of internal struggle. The blond figured that Squall's father was conflicted over the brunette's cutting habit – and the fact that his mother had no clue.

"How often does he do this to himself?"

"I'm not sure, but it's definitely a habitual thing. I've found fresh ones on him twice since I've known him."

"Why does he do it?" the reporter finally asked, while intensely staring at his son as if looking for an answer.

"I don't know," Seifer replied honestly. When he looked down upon the other boy, he couldn't help but run his fingers very lightly through the back of Squall's disheveled hair. "The way I understand it is that he's doing it to deal with something else... something bigger, and darker, and more painful. But I don't know what that is."

He didn't know if it had been his touch or his words that had disturbed his friend's sleep, but the dark haired boy suddenly began to move in his chair. Within a few short seconds, Squall had started to rub his eyes and clumsily un-tucked his legs from beneath his body as he struggled into an upright seating position. He let out a low, throaty groan as his foggy blue gaze wandered around the room, and he finally became stock still when he realized where he was, and who he was with.

"Hey," Seifer greeted him gently as he squatted down next to the brunette's chair, smiling up at the other boy. "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you up."

Laguna noticed the dark circles under the brunette's eyes when the boy looked down upon his friend and shook his head, still looking a bit dazed. To the reporter's dismay, he found that Seifer hadn't been exaggerating when he'd claimed that his boyfriend was completely exhausted – Squall was running on his last, almost depleted reserves of energy, and yet he was forcing himself to wake up and pay attention to those around him.

It was almost painful to watch.

"I'm fine," the brunette replied without pausing to analyze whether that was even true. His blue eyes finally found Laguna's, and Squall sat up further in his chair. "You're awake."

The journalist forced himself to smile in response, if only for the sake of his son. Frankly, he didn't like what he saw. There was no part of himself that was even concerned about his own health – all he cared about was that kid.

"Yeah," he muttered eventually. "Thank you for sitting with me this whole time."

The brunette looked taken aback for a moment, before he dropped his gaze and mumbled with visible discomfort, "Whatever."

"How are you feeling?" the older dark haired man asked.

"Fine," Squall answered, and his tone slipped into a shade of annoyance when he added, "I'm not the one that just had surgery."

"Well, maybe so, but..."

Laguna paused, and his voice trailed off. The boys were gazing back at him expectantly, waiting for the rest of the man's sentence that had somehow gotten lost, when the reporter suddenly cleared his throat and moved his attention to the taller of the two teenagers.

"Seifer," he started with an apologetic smile. "Do you think you could leave us alone for a few minutes?"

The older man took notice of the surprise reflecting fleetingly on Seifer's expression, and the edgy look of disapproval that immediately appeared on Squall's. Nonetheless, the blond boy caught himself quickly and responded demurely, "Yeah, sure. No problem."

Before Squall had the opportunity to object, Seifer had turned around and stalked out of the room, closing the door behind himself. He knew that his stubborn friend probably had no desire to be alone with his father, but the blond had to respect the fact that this couldn't _always _be about what Squall wanted.

'_Maybe a little father-son talk will do him some good. In the end, __**someone **__has to get through to him.'_

Meanwhile, Squall had demonstratively retreated further into his chair, away from the man who was laid out in the bed in front of him. He didn't like the somber, meticulous glare in Laguna's eyes, nor the fact that the guy was barely blinking while he was surveying him from that short, meaningless distance away.

"What?" the scowling brunette boy finally snapped in an impulsive knee-jerk reaction, sounding more unnerved than he liked.

Laguna gently moved his chin towards him in response. "That necklace you're wearing," the man said, causing the boy to flinch. "Who gave that to you?"

Almost out of reflex, Squall quickly pushed the pendant back underneath his shirt, and he shifted irritably in his chair. Still, despite his visible agitation over the subject, he chose to answer his father's question, if only because it wasn't something he felt like lying about.

"My mother and my sister."

"It's a lion," Laguna noted simply.

"Yeah, I know that," the dark haired youth clipped, the words drenched in attitude.

Nodding thoughtfully while ignoring the teen's temper, the reporter asked, "Did your mother ever read you the story of the Lion and the Shooting Star?"

Laguna watched how his son's eyes widened, and although Squall didn't say anything, he really did not need to.

"So she did," the man said with a pleased smile as he read the boy's facial expression correctly. "That makes me happy."

"Why?" Squall growled testily.

"Because it was our story. I gave her that book. It made me think of her, you know what I mean?"

Squall, clearly not _wanting _to understand what his father was talking about, quickly snapped, "No. I don't. It's just a book."

"Well... you see, Raine was my Lion. I was her Shooting Star," Laguna explained in a quiet, almost saddened tone of voice that managed to throw even his ill-tempered son off. "But maybe it was never quite that simple."

"I'm not sure what you're trying to say," Squall muttered abrasively, furrowing his brows. He looked guarded and tense, and it was almost painfully obvious that the topic bothered him on a deeper level. Of course, the reporter from Esthar had no idea how profoundly his son had been affected by that children's book, which had sparked his near obsessive interest in lions so many years ago.

Laguna studied his son patiently for a moment, considering to elaborate on his own love story, before he suddenly changed his mind.

"... Who did this to you?"

Slanting his head as his eyes darkened over this sudden and quite unwelcome twist in their conversation, Squall bit back, "Did what?"

"The guys who attacked you. Who are they?"

"It doesn't matter."

Shaking his head, Laguna burnt his gaze into Squall's and replied intensely, "It matters more than you could ever imagine."

Squall held his father's hard eyes for only a few seconds before his head drifted to the side and he murmured evasively, "Seifer already beat them up. It's done with."

"What if it isn't? What if they'll come back for more?"

"Then I'll _deal_ with it," Squall hissed, now cutting his eyes back towards his father with a cold glare as his voice was grinding with the effort of holding in his anger.

Laguna's lips thinned, and he suddenly raised his right hand to point at the brunette's bandaged wrists. "Like you're dealing with _those_?"

Squall looked perplexed for a moment, before he shot his father a dirty, offended look, and snarled, "That's none of your business!"

Despite the teen's hostility and childish, self-preserving desire to be defensive, Laguna's face suddenly became soft and compassionate, glowing with a kind of fatherly affection that was completely alien to Squall. Even though the boy was far from easily moved by other people's emotions, he couldn't help but swallow visibly as his throat became tight.

"Squall," his father gently voiced his name, his inflection dominated by kindness and a stern, paternal note of concern that was new to both of them. "I didn't risk my life for you today just so I can sit here and watch how you destroy yours. I don't know what part of you thinks it's okay for you to be in pain, because it isn't. None of this is okay."

Opening his mouth to voice some kind of instinctive insult that suddenly wouldn't come to him, Squall stuttered, "I... It..."

"Your life is precious, you know that?" Laguna continued stoically, clearly having realized by now that the brunette boy didn't value his own health as much as he should have. "I'm not going to allow you to be in pain, and I'm also not going to allow something to scare you so much that it makes you want to harm yourself. That is not acceptable, and it never will be. If keeping you from cutting yourself means that I have to throw myself in front of another truck, so be it, as long as you realize that I'm serious about this. You don't have to believe me, but I promise you that I mean what I'm telling you. I will make this go away. No matter what it takes."

As Squall drifted into a stunned sort of silence over his father's passionate words, his fury somehow evaporated, bit by hesitant bit. Despite everything that had happened to him and the deep wounds his stepfather had ripped into his young soul, he had to admit that he believed Laguna was telling him the truth. The man seemed as sincere as any human being could be, and for a moment, Laguna's selfless affection for him almost scared him.

'_I don't... understand...'_

"... What do you want from me?"

Squall asked that question without confrontation, only the helpless confusion of a teenager faced with a kind of love he didn't understand. The smile on Laguna's face didn't falter, nor was there any kind of ulterior motive showing in the delicate green-blue of his eyes.

"I want you to live," Laguna answered calmly. "I want you to value yourself, and I want you to be kind towards your own body. Your life may not mean much to you right now, and I don't know why that is, but it means something to me. It means something to Seifer, and your mother, and your sister, and probably many others whose feelings you aren't even aware of."

The dark haired boy continued to bore his gaze into that of his father, wondering why he wasn't angry over the man's demands. Perhaps he realized that he owed his father for saving his life today, and although he hated to be indebted to others, it bothered him less than it normally would have.

"Are you going to tell her?"

Laguna had to ponder his son's next question for a moment, wondering at the way Squall's nose and eyebrows crinkled into a frown. Finally, he asked, "Tell who? Your mother?"

"Yes," Squall clarified reluctantly. "About..."

He swallowed and cast a quick, suggestive glance at the bandages around his forearms. Laguna shook his head almost instantly.

"No," the reporter said firmly. "I trust you."

"What...?" Squall asked, sounding honestly taken aback.

"I think you'll tell her when you're ready," his father explained. "But until then..."

Laguna never finished that sentence, and he never needed to. Telling Squall not to cut himself again seemed far too easy and perhaps a bit too self-righteous, and he knew it would not yield the desired effect, anyway. Squall would do what he wanted to, and therefore, Laguna realized he would have to completely erase the boy's wish to hurt himself. It wasn't something he could ask from his son, or worse _order _him to do - it was something he would have to accomplish simply by being the father Squall had always needed, but never asked for.

"I understand."

Squall's words were few, but they had been spoken with sincerity as he quietly hung his head. He didn't feel threatened by Laguna's knowledge of his cutting habit, and for some reason, he was overcome by a sense of tranquility over that notion. As he gazed upon his own, marred wrists that were resting motionlessly on his thighs, he realized – not for the first time today – that he wouldn't even be part of this world anymore if it hadn't been for his father. Not too long ago, the difference between his own life and death hadn't much mattered to Squall. As he had surveyed his life and its purpose from the cradle to the grave, everything had blended together into decades worth of futile suffering, and he had wanted to know nothing about love or friendship or the meaning of his own existence. He didn't know when exactly the tables had been turned on him, but he knew that today, things were no longer the same.

Today, for the first time ever, Squall Leonhart was grateful to be alive.

* * *

I hope you've enjoyed this chapter, brutal and a bit chaotic as it was. I know the update was long overdue, and I apologize for that. However, this has been my longest chapter yet, so I hope that at least somewhat makes up for the delay. Thank you for reading and your continued support, which really means so much to me!


	35. Clairvoyant Disease

-:-  
**Chapter 35  
****Clairvoyant Disease**

"_I always have time for a story, love."  
_-:-

Right now you're bruised and bleeding

I see the hurt within your eyes

I know your pain is for a reason

You need to feel just to know that you're alive.

"_To Know That You're Alive" – Kutless_

-:-

They had been sitting in silence, decades of unspoken emotions echoing between them as they tried to make sense of each other's existence. Laguna Loire had so many things he wanted to say to his son, so many things he wanted to ask, and yet the timing didn't seem right for any of it. So much had happened in the short few days they'd known each other, and yet, the boy who looked like a younger mirror image of the reporter was still very much a stranger to him. Laguna wanted nothing more than to change that, but he understood that it would require much patience to even scratch the surface of his son's life; after all, seventeen years of absence couldn't just be blown away in a matter of hours, and he didn't expect the boy to trust and love him on a basis of shared blood alone.

Squall, meanwhile, was still hovering in his armchair by the side of Laguna's hospital bed, shifting occasionally here and there to let out a breath he'd been holding for too long. His mindset, of course, was no less chaotic than that of the older man. At some point or another, he had acknowledged the dark haired journalist as his father, but that didn't mean that he had any idea of what to do with the man now that he was a part of his life. Wanting and having a father were two completely different things, and Squall was barely even familiar with the former of the two concepts. He found himself wondering whether he was expected to fall into his father's arms and love him with all that he had, and it almost scared him that the urge to do just _that_ simply didn't exist within his heart. Through all the years, he'd never imagined that finding his father would bring him more confusion than it would bring him answers.

Honestly, he had no clue where to go from here.

"...I'm gonna get Seifer," the brunette boy eventually announced without emotion into the strangely uncomfortable silence that enveloped Laguna's small hospital room, standing up from his seat. "I'll be right back."

"Oh, right..." the older male agreed in a stretched voice as he watched his son heading towards the door. Squall's stiff, uneven gait was a soundless testimony to his freshly inflicted injuries, and the sight brought a frown to his father's face. Of course, the brunette teenager had to be in a considerable amount of pain, but he put forth a spectacular display of being unaffected by his wounds – both the physical and emotional kind.

Naturally, his parent wasn't quite so composed about the whole thing.

"Squall... wait!" the man from Esthar suddenly exclaimed, consequently interrupting the boy's stride. As the youth halted in confusion and turned halfway towards the bed, facing his father with an expression of subtle irritation, Laguna felt a desperate need to put into words just how much he truly cared for the boy, but unfortunately, he never got that chance. Without notice, the door to the journalist's room opened with a bang and admitted a white-faced, blond haired teenager – the same one who had left them mere minutes ago, and yet he didn't look like the same person at all.

Something wasn't right.

"Seifer," Squall greeted his friend in a perplexed tone as his head veered around to him, and he furrowed his brows when he noticed that the older teen was as pale as the hospital walls. Seifer was clutching his cellphone in one hand, and he looked as if his whole world had just come to a complete standstill.

"What's the matter?" the dark haired teen inquired immediately, staring in alarm at the taller boy as he came to a halt right in front of him.

"I... I just got a call from my mother," Seifer explained in an unsteady, rushed voice, shoving his free hand into his tousled blond hair in a manner of emotional distress. "She said... she said my grandma got... she... she got into an accident... she... with her car, she... She's in a hospital in Balamb, she—"

"Wait, _what_?" Squall interrupted his friend's senseless stuttering. "Your grandmother got into a car accident? _Tonight_?"

"Yes," the blond confirmed the shocking news, barely even noticing the concern that appeared on his classmate's handsome face in return. "My grandmother Belle, she... She... I don't... I..."

Squall, remembering the conversation he'd once had with Seifer at the playground about the wonderful woman who had raised him in place of some hired nanny, could feel his stomach dropping.

"Is she alright?" Laguna asked from his bedside, his voice harsh with worry.

"I don't know," Seifer answered, helplessly shaking his head as he was breathing heavily in and out, choking back tears and a steadily escalating panic. "My mother didn't know how bad it was... she couldn't tell me anything... I need to go see my grandmother, I... I'm sorry, I know this is bad timing, but I really... I..."

"Of course you need to go see her," the reporter agreed almost instantly with his young, agitated visitor. "Are you going to be okay to drive? Balamb is a bit of a trip."

"Yeah, I—"

"I'm coming with you."

Both Seifer and Laguna stopped to stare at Squall, who'd just blurted out that declaration without so much as an ounce worth of hesitation. The brunette looked beat up and tired at best, but there was a foolish kind of determination burning in his eyes that caused his father to raise a brow in skepticism.

"Squall—"

"Absolutely not," Seifer interrupted the older man, resolutely shaking his head at Squall. "You're hurt, you don't need to be—"

"I don't give a fuck!" Squall shot back impatiently, and he placed his hands on his hips with an expression of quiet rage. "I'm coming with you to Balamb."

Grimacing, the blond tried to argue, "Look, I really appreciate the offer, but you need to stay here, you're not—"

"Will you fucking shut up already? All you're doing is wasting time here," the younger boy declared, a shade of cockiness to his frigid inflection that ultimately rendered Seifer speechless. "Besides, I wasn't _asking_ for your permission."

Unsure of what to say, Seifer reeled his head around to face Laguna, who was watching them thoughtfully from his bedside. Neither of the two older males considered it a very sensible idea to let Squall travel to Balamb, which was a solid three hour drive away. In the dark haired boy's unstable condition, it was impossible to predict how he'd be holding up later on during the night.

"Squall, I'm not sure—"

"I don't _care_," the boy cut short his father's attempt at speaking, his words a hiss sharp enough to cut stone. "What part of that do you two not understand? I'm going. I'm practically out of here, anyway. The doctor at the Emergency Room released me. All he wants is a signature."

"I understand that, kid, but be reasonable, you've had a rough day, you—"

"I'm going," Squall repeated with stone-cold resolve, before his voice suddenly became threatening. "... Whether you'll sign for me or not."

With a sigh of resignation, Laguna dropped his forehead into the open palm of his right hand. Was this supposed to be his first taste of what parenting was going to be like? His teenage son was stubborn and impossible to reason with, and obviously the boy's concern for his friend overrode his own fatigue and injuries by lengths. As inconvenient and concerning as it was, Laguna had to admit that he found Squall's desire to stay by his classmate's side quite admirable. From what Raine had told him about the kid, Squall wasn't one to trust people easily by any stretch of the imagination. The brunette was fiercely selective about whom he allowed to be part of his life, and apparently, Seifer had long made the cut.

"... Very well then," Laguna finally agreed, although a bit of reluctance still showed on his face. "I still don't think this is a good idea, but I'll sign for you. I'm going to call your mother, too, to let her know what's going on, although I don't think she will be pleased."

"I know that," the boy admitted, but his expression remained stoic.

"I understand why you're so dead set on going, Squall, so I'll do what I can," his father continued, worry now pouring into his voice. "Just be careful, okay? Don't overdo it. Seifer, I know you have a lot on your mind right now, but I still count on you to keep an eye on him."

"I will," the older teen reassured him, despite the small snort of indignation he received from Squall's end. With a skeptical expression, the blond looked his friend up and down, cringing at the ribbons of bruises and bandages that decorated the brunette's thin, athletic frame. Squall was still wearing the hospital scrub top they had handed him at the ER in place of his own bloodied shirt, but the injured brunette didn't even seem fazed by his own disheveled appearance. As exhausted as he had been this whole time, Squall suddenly looked abnormally energized, and there was a glow in his eyes that Seifer had only seen there on the best of days.

'_This is crazy. It's like he's high or something. He's acting like a total brat, but... fuck... He's doing this for **me**. The only reason he's throwing a tantrum is so he can come with me. Damn.'_

As the deeper meaning of Squall's unnerving behavior fully sank in, Seifer quietly stepped up to the brunette and wrapped one arm around his shoulders, quickly pressing a kiss to the shorter boy's forehead before releasing him again almost immediately. Squall allowed the small display of affection even in front of his father, if only because he realized how scared and agitated his friend truly was.

"We'll call you when we get there, and we'll be sure to check on you, too," Seifer announced firmly as he faced Laguna once more.

"Don't worry about me, I'll be fine," the man assured them with a smile and a dismissive wave of his right hand. "Just let me know how your grandmother is doing. And Squall... make sure you call your mother when you get a chance."

Squall snorted a stubborn "whatever," but he still jerked his chin in a quick nod. He didn't like to be told what to do, least of all by a man who was little more than a stranger to him, but at the same time, he realized that Laguna had a valid point. His mother would be worried sick if she didn't hear from him soon, because it was already fairly late in the evening. Of course, Laguna had promised to talk to her and explain the situation, but that man would never take his place.

No one would.

"Alright, well, let's go, I guess," Seifer ultimately said, motioning Squall towards himself with one hand while raising the other towards Laguna. "See ya, Laguna. And thank you."

The man gave him a thumbs-up and a wry grin in response, managing to look surprisingly cool despite his gimpy leg that was up to his knee in a cast and the painful twitch by the corner of his eyes. His calm, collected exterior inevitably changed, however, when his gaze wandered across his son's deadpan face.

"Squall... I'll see you later, okay?"

Squall picked up on the hopeful plea in his father's nonchalant voice – the unspoken wish that their fragile relationship would be given a chance to grow stronger – and before he cut his gaze away and followed his classmate out of the room, he tilted his head very subtly down and up in a quiet affirmative. It was a tiny motion, barely recognizable to anyone who wasn't watching intently enough, but to his father, who had been watching as closely as any human being possibly could, that insignificant flick of muscle meant much more than Squall would ever know.

* * *

"You should call her."

Squall stirred in his seat, disrupted from his silent, persistent state of brooding by Seifer, who was currently driving them the long way to Balamb. It was well after 10 o'clock at night and they'd been on the road for approximately an hour, but the brunette teen still hadn't managed to muster up the courage to call his mother and tell her what had happened, and where he was going.

"I'm serious."

The seventeen year old boy honored his companion with a dark sideways glare and not much else. He'd been quiet since they had left the hospital, because there were plenty of worries crawling inside his head to keep him occupied for days. Of course, Squall knew that Seifer was feeling on edge over his grandmother, and he wanted to come up with some magical thing to say or do to make the blond feel better, but truthfully, he had no idea what he was even trying to accomplish here. Demanding to come along to Seifer's home had been an impulsive reaction driven by a quick upsurge of emotion rather than careful deliberation, and although he still wanted to be by his companion's side, he was no longer convinced that this whole thing was such a great idea. In the end, he figured that these were not the right kind of circumstances to be meeting Seifer's parents.

'_It's not just that. There's Mom... and Laguna... and all the shit at school I haven't even dealt with yet. There's so much going on, I don't have the slightest idea where to start. I want to help Seifer, but I don't even know what I can do. If anything, I'll probably just be in the way. Dammit. What a fucking mess.'_

"Squall—"

"I know, _alright_?" the brunette cut his friend off with an angry snap, slamming his left fist down on the console between them in a forceful outburst of frustration. "I know!"

Seifer watched him from the other side of the truck cabin, his face showing reprimand that required no words. Squall reciprocated his disapproving looks with tons of childish defiance to spare, until the brunette's gaze latched onto the tiredness in the blond's bloodshot eyes and the unnatural pallor of his skin. As a twinge of guilt stabbed him straight in the heart, Squall blew out a breath and veered his head aside, back towards the windshield.

"... I'm sorry," the dark haired boy apologized with a subtle grinding of teeth, not knowing that Seifer wasn't looking for his remorse. "I just... don't know what to say to her."

"You'll figure it out," the blond replied gently, realizing that he had gotten under Squall's skin. "You always do."

Letting out a dry, cynical chuckle, the dark haired boy muttered with a growl, "Yeah, you're making it sound a lot simpler than it is."

"You've already told her plenty of things that weren't exactly easy for you," Seifer reminded him wisely. "If anyone can handle this, it's you."

With a thoughtful tilt to his head, Squall tried to find the truth in Seifer's carefully selected words. He reflected, partly unwillingly, on the difficult conversations he'd shared with his mother in the recent past – the night he'd called her and told her he was sleeping over at Seifer's apartment, the day he'd told her about the ball, the night he had confirmed their romantic relationship to her... and the fateful evening he had met Laguna and allowed the man to gatecrash into all of their lives.

"I guess you have a point," the brunette admitted in a slow, concise manner, "But I—"

Squall's sentence, however thoughtful it might have been, was never finished, because he was suddenly interrupted by the loud chiming of his cellphone going off in his lap.

'_What the...?'_

Confused, Squall glanced at the display, realizing with a cringe that he knew exactly who was calling him so late at night.

"... It's my mother."

"Well," Seifer announced, sounding a tad too pleased for Squall's liking, "Guess that takes care of that."

Rolling his eyes, the brunette suppressed a sigh as he flipped the phone open and pressed the receiver to his left ear.

"Yes?"

_"Squall, __**where**__ are you?"_

His mother's voice sounded razor sharp and hunted, much louder than normal, interlaced with panic she was trying and yet failing to hold at bay. Furrowing his brows, the boy balled his free hand to a fist and started to tap it lightly against the cold glass of his side door window.

"Hey, Mom... Uh... we're on our way to Balamb," Squall explained in a tone that suggested carelessness. His eyes were focused on his own kneecaps as he spoke. "We're about halfway there."

_"What? You're going to __**Balamb**__? What on earth...? **Why**? It's the middle of the night! What in the world is going on, Squall? Are you okay?"_

"Yeah, of course. I'm fine."

_"But... Laguna said you were in the hospital, he said you were hurt, that you—"_

"Mom," he interrupted her frantic stammering with a long, drawn out breath. "I'm fine. Seriously. Calm down."

"_But—_"

"Did Laguna tell you why Seifer and I are going to Balamb?"

_"No, he... well, I suppose he tried, I think, but I... Well, I hung up on him."_

"Oh," Squall acknowledged that bit of unexpected information with a stumped expression. "Well, uh... it... The thing is... uh, something... happened. Seifer's grandmother got into a car accident tonight and we don't know how bad it is. She lives in Balamb with the rest of his family. I'm going with Seifer to see her."

"_**What**?"_

"Yeah. Seriously, did Laguna not tell you anything?" the brunette asked sourly.

_"No, he... well... we didn't get to talk, really... I..."_

"Mom, did you... I mean, did Laguna explain to you what happened today? Where he's at, and why?"

_"No, he really didn't have a chance to say much of anything. He just told me that you'd been hurt and had been seen at the Emergency Room. Then he said you had left with Seifer. That's when I hung up on him to call you."_

Sighing, Squall said, "Mom... you need to call him back. Laguna is still at the hospital. They admitted him. He... he broke his leg."

_"What? He broke his **leg**? What are you talking about? He didn't mention anything about that! How did this happen? Is he alright? How—"_

"Mom, listen to me. It's alright. Relax. He's fine. Just call him back, and he'll explain everything," the brunette tried to assure her, knowing full well that he was taking the easy way out by avoiding her questions and pawning them off on Laguna. Closing his eyes, he rubbed his right fist against his forehead. "He... he's at Galbadia General Hospital in room 3775, if you wanna see him, or whatever."

_"Oh... Okay, I will, definitely, I... but... Squall, honey, why aren't you telling me what's going on? How did all of this happen? I don't understand!"_

"It's... a long story," he bit evasively, cutting his gaze outwards through the window once more. The sky was a sea of shapeless black clouds, but a crisp, full moon illuminated the snow covered landscape around them. He could see no cars or signs of civilization for miles, and Deling City suddenly seemed so far away. "I'll talk to you about it when I get back. I'm sorry, Mom."

_"But you're hurt, you—"_

"Don't worry about me, okay? I'm fine, there's nothing to get upset about. It's no big deal, I swear. It's just a couple scratches."

Squall ignored his friend's pregnant sideways glance at that comment, and with a scowl he added, "I will explain everything later, okay? Just... don't worry. Everything is alright. I just... I have to do this. Do you understand?"

She didn't answer him right away, and Squall knew that she was upset. His mother had always been exceptionally understanding and patient with him, but Squall had also never made it a habit to make her worry about him or his health. He'd never been injured much as a child, and ever since he'd hit puberty he had kept every cut and bruise a secret.

He'd never planned on changing that.

_"... I don't like it that you're not telling me what's going on, but... I do understand why you're going with Seifer. You're worried about him. I get it. Just... will you please at least let me know when you make it to Balamb?"_

"Of course," Squall agreed, relieved that she had finally decided to give in.

_"But, Squall... if you start to feel bad, please go to the hospital in Balamb and call me immediately, okay? Don't be reckless."_

"I won't be. I promise."

_"Are you **sure** you're alright? I mean, you haven't been to the hospital in years, you—"_

"Mom, I'm fine, I swear," he interrupted her, his voice slipping this time as he realized he was running out of excuses and his mother wasn't simply going to drop the subject. He knew he had to cut this conversation short while he still could. "Go see Laguna, okay? He'll explain everything that happened. I'll call you once I get to Balamb. I promise. I'm sorry, I gotta go now."

_"But... Squall, I don't... Are you really sure that... I mean..."_

"Everything's fine. Trust me. There's nothing to worry about. Anyway, I'll talk to you later, Mom."

_"Well, I... But... Okay... Well..."_

"Bye, Mom."

_"... Bye, love."_

Suppressing another sigh, Squall flipped his phone shut and tossed it onto the dashboard of Seifer's truck with a frown bending his features. Honestly, he hated doing this to his mother, but at this point in time, he didn't feel like he was left with many other options. He wasn't sure why he had even suggested to her to visit Laguna at the hospital, but that was yet another thing he really didn't feel like thinking about right now.

"You doing alright?" the handsome blond at the other side of the truck questioned, surveying his friend with attentive jade green eyes.

"Yeah," Squall answered promptly, although he was subconsciously shaking his head at the same time. Groaning, the brunette scratched his right temple, trying to untangle the dried, sticky mess that was his hair. "Did you get a hold of your mother?"

"No," Seifer murmured with a hint of defeat in his voice, throwing a quick glance at his own cell phone that was resting on his seat, between his legs. "Still goes straight to voicemail, and my dad is at some conference, so it's not like he'll be any fuckin' help. Ah, whatever. It's all good. I'm sure my grandma's fine."

The brunette watched his classmate's face closely, noting that Seifer wasn't very good at playing down his emotions. The blond had never struck him as a very skilled liar, and perhaps that was a good thing. His concern showed no less clearly on his face than any other emotion he'd ever conveyed to Squall, whether willingly or not.

"... I'm sorry."

"Huh?" Seifer's head streaked around to him in question, but Squall only regarded him with a serious expression on his maltreated and yet still strikingly attractive face. "What do you mean, sorry?"

"Sorry you have to deal with this."

"Squall... I'm not the one who had to go through hell today," the blond said, his tone honestly incredulous as he gave Squall an estranged look. "I should be the one apologizing to _you_ for dragging you along."

"You're not 'dragging' me anywhere," the dark haired boy corrected him, masking his concern for Seifer by adopting a tone of pragmatic arrogance. "If you think you could drag me anywhere against my will, you need a reality check."

Seifer could have argued that point if he had absolutely been hell bent on doing so, but he figured that this was simply Squall's unrefined way of letting him know that he _wanted_ to be there for him. Truly, this trip was nothing but an inconvenience for the injured brunette. He would miss another day of school, he was worrying the crap out of his mother, and he was spending hours cooped up in the passenger seat of Seifer's truck, instead of in a hospital bed as he should have been.

'_I never figured he really cared this much. With all the insults and neutering threats, it's kinda hard to tell sometimes. But I guess I should have known better.'_

"Anyway... We'll be there soon," Seifer gently changed the topic, a smile flickering across his tired features as his gaze locked with Squall's. "Try to get some sleep."

"I'm fine."

"I'm not your mother, Squall. You don't have to pretend to be anything for me," the blond noted calmly, instantly causing the brunette's face to fall. Before Squall had a chance to get angry, however, Seifer suddenly reached towards the backseat of his truck and pulled one of his numerous fleece jackets to the front. As he moved his focus back to the road, he tossed the comfortable garment into Squall's lap and draped it across the boy's knees like a blanket. "You can be 'fine' later, if you absolutely insist, but for now, be quiet and get some rest."

On any other given day, Squall might have lobbed the next best hefty object at Seifer's enormous head for his annoying attitude, but tonight, part of him had come to understand that the blond was only being a pain in the ass for his sake alone. They each had mastered their own way of showing that they cared, and although their communication skills still needed extensive amounts of work, they had managed to meet somewhere in the middle... right there, in the stillness of a night that belied the harrowing terrors of the day.

* * *

"Squall."

He jumped, pale lids snapping wide over a surface of startled sky blue. Sleep had been pushed from his mind too fast, and for a moment, he felt lost and scared, not knowing where or who he was aside from some frightened little boy who'd been tortured by a dream much too dark to recall.

"... Hey. We're here."

Understanding flooded his eyes when he saw the tall blond teenager standing right next to him, the passenger door by his side open towards the dense, cool blackness of the night that enveloped them both. He recalled that they had been on their way to the hospital in Balamb, and to Squall's irritation, he had to realize that he had dozed off at some point during their trip. He had never planned on going to sleep, but he could only deny himself the most basic human needs for so long before the deficits eventually caught up with him. Squall had made it a habit early on in life to run on as little rest and nourishment as he possibly could, but even his body had limits that couldn't be overcome by willpower alone.

In all truth, Squall Leonhart had passed the point of mere exhaustion a long time ago.

"Where are we...?" the brunette asked when his blurred gaze finally adjusted and he realized that they had stopped inside some kind of neon lit parking garage.

"Balamb Memorial Hospital," Seifer answered, while throwing a curt glance over his shoulder. "We're on the parking deck."

"Shit. I fell asleep," Squall stated the obvious, looking contrite and displeased with himself as his features curled. "Sorry."

"Quit apologizing for shit you don't need to be sorry for," the older teen growled, his patience with Squall running thinner tonight than it normally would. "Trust me, I _wanted_ you to get some sleep. Anyway, come on, let's get out."

As Squall shoved Seifer's jacket from his lap and unbuckled his seatbelt, he asked, "Did you get a hold of your mother?"

"Yeah," the eighteen year old answered, and Squall found that he sounded relieved. "She said my grandma is still down in the ER, but she's doing fine. They're just keeping her overnight for observation, because of her age and stuff."

"That's good," Squall said, breathing a sigh as some of his tension dissipated.

"Yeah. I'm still glad we came out here, though," Seifer murmured vaguely as he took a step aside and watched Squall climbing out of the truck. When his feet in dirty leather boots hit the ground, the brunette's knees seemed to buckle momentarily, and Seifer instinctively grabbed his arm and yanked him closer. "Hey, whoa, you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," came the boy's automatic retort. He straightened up abruptly and closed the door to Seifer's truck, while nonchalantly shifting out of the older boy's hold. "Let's go."

Seifer stood next to Squall and watched him out of narrowed, piercing green eyes, but said nothing. Wordlessly, he motioned towards one of the exit signs that led towards the elevator. As Squall started walking, the blond made sure to keep as close to the brunette as he could without seeming completely laughable in his efforts. The stubborn dark haired teen might have claimed that he was fine, but Seifer knew full well that he was far from it.

'_I'll be damned before I'm letting you out of my sight, cupcake.'_

"I'm not gonna fall, if that's why you're practically waltzing on my toes here, dumbass," Squall remarked dryly as he continued to trudge towards the elevator, obviously aware of Seifer's unwelcome and less-than-subtle attempt at being his knight in shining armor.

"I know," Seifer answered casually, with a crooked smile, meaning every word of it. He didn't feel the need to explain that the only reason he was so certain Squall would not hit the ground was because he would never allow it to happen.

'_Yeah, you aren't face-planting on __**my**__ watch, princess. Don't even get any ideas.'_

They took the elevator three floors down, spending the few minutes it took them to find the Emergency Room in utter silence. The surgically clean, brightly lit hallways of the hospital were deserted. It was late at night and well past visiting hours, but Seifer's mother had assured the blond over the phone that he'd still be able to see his grandmother. Apparently, patients in the ER were not subject to the same rules as those located on the floors.

Finally, they'd made it to the nearly empty lobby and waiting room. Aside from a handful of security guards, a nurse and a secretary, Seifer and Squall were the only people occupying the large hall with the cold linoleum floors and rows of grey plastic chairs. As they stalled for a moment, trying to figure out how to gain access to Seifer's grandmother, Squall noticed the middle aged, blonde haired nurse in bright blue scrubs sitting expectantly behind a desk giving him the side-eye.

"Can I help you?" the woman asked, raising her voice to elicit their attention. Her brown eyed gaze was fixed on Squall and the bruises that embellished his pale skin when the boys turned towards her. "Do you need to be seen, hun?"

"What? No," the brunette refused hastily, shaking his head. "We're here to visit somebody."

"Oh. Okay," the nurse responded, still studying his face with an alertness that made Squall uncomfortable. "Who is it you're trying to see?"

When the two teenagers approached her desk, they noticed her typing a few rapid sequences on the keyboard of a computer situated in front of her. As they leaned onto the counter, Squall traced her plastic employee tag with his eyes, without ever actually registering the woman's name. For some reason, his mind felt disconnected from his body – he was aware of his surroundings, and yet he wasn't. His head was aching, but he chose not to acknowledge the dull, constant pain throbbing at the base of his skull. The brunette could tell that something wasn't right, but he couldn't even have begun to explain what it was.

"Are you okay?" the woman asked promptly, catching on to his empty stare and the hospital scrub top he was wearing with a kink of her brow.

"Yeah," he said, visibly snapping out of it as his gaze regained clarity and he quickly met her eyes. "Uh... We're here to see my friend's grandmother. She was in an accident."

"What's her name?"

"It's Belle Almasy," Seifer answered, semiconsciously grabbing one of the ballpoint pens that had been resting on the counter in front of him. Squall watched him fidgeting with the pen, clicking it aimlessly. "I was told she's still down here."

"She is," the nurse informed them after consulting her monitor for a few seconds. "Let me get you some visitor tags and then you can go back there. She's in room 36."

"Thanks."

"You sure you boys are alright?" the petite blonde asked as she took two yellow plastic tags with black lettering that read 'Visitor' and slid them across the counter.

"Well—"

"Yeah," Squall cut off his classmate before Seifer had a proper chance to open his mouth and say something stupid. "We're fine. Thanks."

"Rough night?" she asked suggestively, glancing from the brunette to the blond, and back again.

"Something like that," the dark haired boy muttered as he pinned the visitor badge to the pocket stitched onto the front of his top. He could feel something lurching in the pit of his stomach every time he moved, but there was no way in hell he was going to inform that nosy nurse or his annoying friend about the uncomfortable state of his gastrointestinal tract.

"I see," the nurse replied vaguely. "Well, if you change your mind, just talk to any of our nurses in there and they'll get you taken care of. You can get in through that door right here."

"Thanks."

Paying her no further attention, Squall waited for the double doors behind the woman's desk to swing open automatically. As he passed through into the back of the Emergency Room, he could feel Seifer's presence closely behind him. When he took a few steps away from the doors, which closed behind them once more, Squall noticed small, bright slivers of light flitting through his vision, like tiny stars that had dropped from the ceiling. The sounds around him had suddenly become dull, and he could barely hear the blond talking to him.

"Squall, you sure you're alright? You look a little out of it."

Seifer's stubborn concern, as well as the fact that his body wasn't functioning the way it should have been, caused something inside Squall to finally snap. Whipping around to his obnoxious classmate, the dark haired boy spat, "If you ask me one more _fucking_ time, I will fucking punch you, you understand?"

Squall manically tried to focus on Seifer's face, tried to map the confusion he now found there, but for some reason, the hallway had suddenly started spinning clockwise around him. As the vision of Seifer in front of him tilted sideways, Squall fell against the wall, and he barely managed to grab the handrail that had been installed all around the perimeter of the ER.

"Squall!"

Panting, Squall tried to force his eyesight to steady as he clung to the wall for support. He could feel Seifer grabbing his arm, and yet he shoved the blond away, snapping in a strangled voice, "Don't touch me!"

"Are you crazy? You're about to fall over, dumbass, I'm not—"

"Stop," the dark haired teen ordered through gritted teeth, finally pressing his eyelids together just so he wouldn't have to watch the room see-sawing back and forth. The knuckles of his fingers turned white as he was helplessly clutching the railing. "Stop _talking_! Sh-shit..."

Then, suddenly, he found himself sandwiched between Seifer and the wall, the gaps between their bodies made insignificant by the blond pressing into him with all the strength he could muster. Squall struggled, if only out of reflex, but he felt strong arms snaking around him only tighter in return, belittling his uncoordinated efforts. For a brief, childish moment, the brunette tried to fight against his friend with everything he had in him, but the more he fought, the more he could feel a scream rising in the back of his throat.

"_Don't_—"

"Shh-shh, I know. I know. It's okay," a calm voice suddenly reassured him, the hushed words barely more than a breath and a sigh ghosting Squall's cheek, muting the panic rioting inside his mind. "It's okay. I know. I got you."

And just like that, it stopped. Seifer's unyielding arms brought balance to Squall's unsteady frame, and his life that had been shaken by horror and violence, not just today. Squall finally ceased to attempt to force his way out of Seifer's embrace, and he noticed that the room was no longer moving. Somehow, his world had fallen back into a fragile state of equilibrium.

"You're hurt," the smooth baritone of Seifer's voice whispered sadly as his right hand dug into Squall's back. "You've been through _so_ fuckin' much today. You _need_ to take it easy."

Squall was silent now, reduced to nothing but a hitched number of too-fast breaths, a cry held and a tragedy unspoken. His head with that tangled mess of normally feathery brown hair was being molded somewhere into Seifer's chest, his lips smothered by fabric and muscle. Still, as uncomfortable as his position was, anything was better than that frightening feeling of the ground being swept out from underneath his feet.

"Are you sure you're up for this...?"

Squall took note of the older boy's concerned whisper, and he finally acknowledged it with a nod of confidence that was no longer his own. He didn't actually free himself from the blond's hold, though, until he could hear a stranger clearing his throat somewhere close by.

"Uhh, hey... you guys, uhm, alright?"

Seifer could feel his friend jerking in shock, and when he loosened his embrace in response, Squall wasted no time in pushing him away. An unknown male in scrubs had stopped next to them, looking them both up and down with a quizzical expression. Obviously, two boys clinging to each other wasn't the most common sight in this particular corner of Galbadia, and he could tell from Squall's posture that the brunette was freaked out by the idea of a stranger witnessing them in that intimate kind of position.

'_Hell, what else is new?'_

"Yeah, we're fine," Squall answered as he straightened out his shirt with a quick jerk of his shoulders, instantly regaining his composure. "We're looking for room 36."

"Oh. Right over there. First room on the left around the corner."

Squall followed the male's directive, muttering a rushed "thanks" under his breath as he scurried out of sight. Seifer stood baffled for a few seconds longer, before snapping out of his stupor and following the brunette into the next hallway, to a closed door.

"Room 36. Here we go," the blond announced with a grim smile as his eyes scanned the plastic double digits set into the wall, before performing a series of quick knocks on the pale colored wood in front of him. When he heard a familiar female voice inviting them to come in, Seifer rushed to comply. Naturally, Squall was noticeably more hesitant, but while he quickly started to feel overwhelmed by the situation, he also figured he hadn't come all the way to Balamb in the middle of the night just to stake out in front of Seifer's grandmother's hospital room.

When the boys entered, Squall instantly took notice of the diminutive, silver-haired woman resting comfortably in a hospital bed across from their position, covered by several starch white sheets and woolen blankets. Her bed was surrounded by two plastic chairs, one of which was occupied by another female, who raised her green eyes towards them upon their entry. Judging by her pin straight blonde hair, which she wore woven into a bun at the nape of her neck, and her sharp, aristocratic features that weren't unlike Seifer's, Squall needed only one guess to figure out who the woman was.

'_That has to be Seifer's mother... I think her name is Elaine. Elaine Almasy.'_

Squall, observant as he was, immediately noted the sharp crease that appeared between the blonde woman's perfectly plucked brows as she sized up her son and his unexpected companion. As the brunette glanced from her to the older woman tucked away in the hospital bed, he couldn't help but feel a sudden tension in the room that clearly hadn't been there before.

"Seifer," the blonde female called her son's name, slowly getting up from her chair. Her teenage boy, however, barely acknowledged her presence as he darted straight for the elderly lady that was beaming at him from across the room.

"Grandma," Seifer huffed as he lunged for the silver haired woman eagerly and drew her into a huge bear hug, causing her to let out a small laugh. "Are you okay?"

"Oh, of course I am, silly boy," the woman named Belle chided, gently patting his right cheek with her hand as he inched away to examine her further. "I'm glad to see you, but you didn't have to come all the way out here from Deling City just for me! It's a long drive."

"Nonsense," the brawny teenager disagreed. "I had to make sure you were alright."

"I'm just fine, darling. I'll be out of here in a jiffy, you'll see."

"So what happened? Did you mess up Grandpa's Jaguar again?" Seifer teased her with a chuckle. It was obvious that he had been more worried about her than he had wanted to let on, and his relief showed clearly on his face.

"Why, of course I did," she said with a cheeky glow in her bright blue eyes. "I suppose he needed an excuse to buy a new one, anyway."

"Grandpa has never needed an excuse to buy anything that has an engine," Seifer joked. "Where's the old rascal at, anyway?"

"He's in Esthar with your father, of course. He'd never miss an opportunity to play on that excellent golf course out there."

"That would figure."

"_Seifer_."

Both Seifer and Squall moved their attention to the blond's mother, who had crossed her arms in front of her chest and was regarding her son with a certain look of disapproval.

"Oh, hello, Mom," Seifer greeted her, tilting his lips into a wry grin. There was a touch of sarcasm in his voice now, and a lack of physical affection towards her which didn't elude Squall's attention. "Good to see you."

"Yes," she said thinly, the disdain in her voice subtle, but noticeable even to a stranger. Then, her head suddenly turned and her gaze slid across the room to Squall, who was lingering by the door, feeling somewhat out of place. Of course, the brunette didn't miss how her nose crinkled as she studied his disastrous appearance, which stood in harsh contrast to her own immaculate dark blue designer pant suit and nude colored heels. Her make-up and hairdo were flawless to a point of ridiculousness, and Squall suddenly remembered that the woman was supposedly a successful plastic surgeon.

"And who are _you, _if you don't mind me asking?"

Arrogance colored her frosty inflection, causing Squall's posture to stiffen in response as he reciprocated the slender woman's hard gaze. It was obvious that Seifer hadn't told his mother about his relationship with his brunette classmate, and while any other young man might have felt hurt or offended over such disregard, Squall wasn't even fazed by it. He could tell that Seifer's relationship with his parents was – at best – strained, and that they didn't approve of their insolent son's sexual preferences.

Squall, of course, had never been the type to complicate a situation. He had also been taught a fantastic set of manners, so he simply inclined his head in a polite gesture and answered, "I'm sorry I didn't introduce myself. My name is Squall Leonhart. I'm a friend of Seifer's from Deling City."

"... That's not true."

Baffled, Squall yanked his head around to stare at Seifer, who was looking back at him from his grandmother's bedside with a resolute glare in his emerald green eyes. The blond had just blurted out his blatant disagreement with the brunette's introduction, and Squall wasn't entirely sure why.

"Excuse me?" Seifer's mother Elaine exclaimed, sounding almost as taken aback as Squall looked.

"He's not telling the truth," Seifer explained with an unreadable expression, causing Squall to narrow his eyes at him from across the room. "I don't know if he's just trying to be polite or what, but he's a _lot_ more than just a friend."

"_What_?"

Squall couldn't help but cringe visibly when Seifer's mother proceeded to glare daggers first at her son, then at him, and he wished that the older boy would've just kept his mouth shut. The brunette didn't think that this was the time or the place to turn their romantic relationship into any kind of discussion.

"I see," the light haired woman simply replied as her cold, calculated gaze rested on Squall, and her face soured. "I guess I never _did_ expect you to listen to me or your father."

"It was never about _listening_, mother," Seifer snarled. "You think everything I do is about you, don't you? Look, I hate to piss in your cheerios, but not everything in this world revolves around you or my noticeably absentee father."

"No, that's right, because everything revolves around you, doesn't it? Honestly, what has gotten into you, Seifer? Did you really have to bring one of your little boy toys _here_, when your grandmother is sick?" Elaine shot back, and there was a nasty, wounding inflection to her voice. "Do you really think this is the _occasion_, Seifer?"

"What, should I have worn a tie to make it more formal?" Seifer simpered, before taking a mock bow in his parent's direction. "Mother, meet my boyfriend, Squall Leonhart. Squall, meet my insufferable mother, Elaine Almasy."

"How dare you," his mother hissed, her voice hitching several angry octaves. "Show some respect, Seifer!"

"Listen, there are exactly three people in this room that I respect, and I'm afraid you're not really one of them," Seifer drawled with a bored shrug, fully ignoring the fact that his mother was about to go up in a cloud of rage. "But I know you and Dad don't really care about that, anyway. Obedience over respect, right? Don't worry, I paid attention. I just don't really give a rat's ass at the moment."

"... You and I are going to have a word, young man," Elaine announced, her icy inflection belying the full extent of her scorching anger. "_Outside._"

"I didn't come here to argue with you," he defied her with a snarl.

"I don't much care what you came here for," she shot back. "Unless you want to find your bank accounts cut off and your truck towed out from underneath you, you will step outside right this minute."

Seifer merely rolled his eyes at the threat, which he had heard one too many times to take it seriously, but despite that willful demonstration of audacity, he shoved his hands into his pockets and shuffled towards the door. "I'll be right back," he informed his classmate as he pushed past him, clicking his tongue almost teasingly as he bumped his shoulder into Squall's in a small, boyish display of affection. Squall didn't know whether the gesture had been meant to reassure him or if it had solely been aimed to piss off Seifer's mother further, but he figured that right now, there likely wasn't much of a noteworthy difference. With a vacant expression, Squall watched how both generations of Almasys left in a dramatic manner that only hinted at the full extent of their family problems, closing the door behind them as they departed.

As he stood in the middle of the room, feeling like nothing short of the awkward fifth wheel, Squall suddenly registered someone's eyes on himself. As he chanced a quick, uncertain glance at Seifer's grandmother, he noticed that the woman was smiling back at him kindly.

"Squall, wasn't it?" she recited his unusual name with a pleasant inflection, before motioning at one of the empty chairs by her side invitingly. "I'm Belle, Seifer's grandmother. It's very nice to meet you, although the circumstances leave something to be desired, don't they? Anyway, please, have a seat, will you?"

The brunette was confused by her unexpected lack of animosity towards him, as well as the fact that she seemed so unaffected by the family drama that had just unfolded so explosively in her presence. Not wanting to upset the fragile looking old woman (who, he naively figured, could be stricken by a heart attack any given minute), he slowly walked towards her and sank down in one of the chairs with a creak.

"So, you're a special friend of my grandson's, is that right?" she asked with a small, knowing smile. He hesitated, before confirming the obvious with a curt nod.

"I'm very glad he brought you along, love. Are you from Deling City, then?" she asked as she regarded him with a friendly, and yet somewhat unreadable expression.

"Kind of," he answered clumsily, while training his eyes on his own shoelaces. He was shuffling his feet on the floor, looking fidgety and uncomfortable. Squall had never been very skilled at the art of small talk, but he figured that it would be at least a few long minutes before Seifer's return. Ignoring the blond's grandmother didn't exactly strike him as a good idea, although it was certainly an option that had crossed his mind.

"That's wonderful, dear. Do you live on your own like Seifer does, or do your parents live there, as well?"

"Uh... no, my parents live in Deling City, too."

"Oh, I see. That's lovely," she conversed with him easily, acting as if he was the single most interesting person in the world, which he found somewhat strange. "Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

"I... yeah. I have a younger sister," Squall explained, his expression shifting slightly as his eyes radiated pride. "She's five."

"How wonderful! I'm sure you must love being an older brother," she exclaimed with a smile.

"I do."

"What about your grandparents, dear?" she continued. "Where do they live?"

He looked up at her, his young features showing confusion. Before he could have thought better of it, he said, "Uh... I don't..."

When the boy abruptly fell silent, mentally censoring himself, Belle gazed upon him with rising intrigue.

"You don't what, darling?" she coaxed him gently.

He gazed at her pale skinned face, which was wrinkled and yet still remarkably radiant, framed by loose silver curls that fell softly upon her shoulders. Her blue eyes were studying him with unprejudiced kindness that he wasn't much accustomed to, particularly from strangers.

"I don't have any grandparents," he admitted, without being entirely sure why he volunteered that information so easily.

"What? What do you mean, you don't have any grandparents, sweetheart?"

"It's... a long story," Squall answered, sounding reluctant and evasive. His eyes averted to the ground once more as he started to chew on his bottom lip with a defeated expression.

"Well, I always have time for a story, love," she said with an encouraging smile, sitting up in her bed expectantly and placing her hands in her lap.

Squall could tell that she was genuinely interested in him and what he had to say, and for some reason, he didn't feel pressured or threatened by her curiosity at all. There was something oddly soothing about this elderly woman in the pink hospital gown, and for a moment, the child in him found himself wondering if all grandmothers were like her. After all, it wasn't something he would have known. Grandparents were yet another item on the list of things that Squall had been denied as a child. Kato's parents had died years ago, and the lawyer didn't seem to mingle much with his extended family. Raine's parents, of course, had never been in the picture to begin with.

Fidgeting with the bandages around his wrists, Squall finally explained in a low voice, "My family is... complicated. I've just never met my grandparents, that's all."

"I see," she replied simply, unwilling to pry further in a past that the boy was obviously guarding so fiercely. "That is truly unfortunate. But it's quite alright, darling, trust me. Seifer will be more than happy to share, I'm sure, and I can always do with another grandson, you know. After all, I only have one."

"What?" Squall asked, sounding dumbfounded.

"Nobody should be without a grandmother, love," she declared as she was beaming at him – obviously, 'grandmother' was a title she carried with pride. "That simply will not do."

Squall stared back at her, not knowing what to say. Suddenly, the woman reached out her delicate looking hand, and she brushed her fingers across the brunette's cheek with a sad expression.

"You've been through a lot," she said in a soft tone, tilting her head almost sorrowfully as she cupped his face. Her skin felt like rice paper against his own, and he worried briefly that he would hurt her if he moved just a little too hastily. Still, as non-threatening as she appeared, he couldn't help but recoil slightly from her touch, which was so foreign to him.

"It's nothing," the brunette attempted to dismiss her concern, but his quiet voice was grinding with the effort of holding in his true emotions. He didn't understand why the woman was so insanely nice to him, and he had no idea how to respond to her behavior properly. He found it strange that she would offer a random teenager she had known for less than five minutes to become his grandmother, but then again, he figured he shouldn't have expected much else, considering she was related to Seifer of all people. His whole family seemed to be a bit on the bizarre side.

"I'm not just talking about these bruises, darling," she told him calmly as she retracted her hand, and Squall noticed that her eyes were searching his face with greater intensity now. Feeling helpless, he dropped his gaze back to the floor, not understanding why the woman seemed to see straight through him.

"It's really no big deal," he said, avoiding the subject. "I'm sorry. I guess I'm just tired."

"Then why don't you rest for a while?" she offered. "You must be exhausted."

"I... No, I'm okay."

"It's alright, love. You look like you've had a rough day, you shouldn't push yourself too hard. Just take it easy for a bit," she suggested kindly, but she didn't miss the guarded glare in his grey-blue eyes. The boy looked on edge, and there was something in his face she had seen too many times in a past far from forgotten.

"I can't. Seifer will be back soon," Squall contemplated, fishing for excuses that sounded pathetic, even to him. In all honesty, there was just simply no way he'd lay back and take a nap in the presence of a complete stranger, whether they were eighty years old and weighed about a hundred pounds or not.

"Darling, I'm sure his entrance will be noisy, as usual, and impossible to miss," she said, her lighthearted laughter suddenly filling the air. "I'm afraid it will take them a while to finish arguing and cool their tempers enough to come back inside, though."

"I didn't want to cause any trouble," the brunette murmured, his inflection remorseful as he scratched the inside of his left wrist with his thumb. "I'm really sorry."

"Those two have been arguing since the moment Seifer learned to speak his first word, and they will still be arguing long after I'm gone," Belle explained patiently. "Child, you are no trouble at all."

"I'm the reason his mother was upset with him," Squall argued, sounding grim.

"My daughter-in-law has spent the past few years in a constant state of upset. It's something she chooses, not something you did."

"But... I insisted on coming along. Obviously, I'm the one who caused this fight."

"No, love, you didn't," she corrected him gently. "Don't blame yourself for something that isn't your fault. I can tell that there are many things in this world you feel responsible for, but this shouldn't be one of them."

She caught his stare – the hunted look of a boy who felt that he had exposed too much, made himself too vulnerable – and she realized that she had said something she should have rather kept to herself. The wise woman watched him shutting down right in front of her, and her heart became heavy as she gradually came to understand how troubled the boy truly was. The brunette would not speak of his pain, and yet it showed in bright colors on his face.

"I... I think I'm going to get some coffee," Squall suddenly informed her, abruptly jumping to his feet, and she could see years of mistrust and fright rising in his eyes as his posture became closed.

"Oh, of course. I think there is a cafeteria just down the hall from here," she offered the information liberally, clearly not wanting to force him to stay against his will. "I'm sure they have coffee there, darling. I bet one of the nurses can point you in the right direction."

"Okay, thank you," Squall answered politely as he looked down upon her, and suddenly he became hesitant. "Uhm, would you like anything?"

"Oh no, I'm fine, darling. Thank you very much."

"Okay. I'll be right back."

As she watched her grandson's newest paramour leaving the room with a soundless kind of grace stalled only by the aftermath of his injuries, Belle Almasy's head tilted with quiet reverence. In the years she had been aware of Seifer's ambiguous sexual interests and non-judgmentally studied the string of male and female lovers he had brought home, none of them had ever struck her like this one. By her awareness, the polite dark haired boy was neither Seifer's typical type, nor did he even seem like the kind of young man who found the concept of love in any way endearing. There was something forlorn and preoccupied about the handsome brunette named Squall – as if he had much more important things on his young mind than a boyhood romance.

"Hey! What the hell? Where did he go?"

Belle flinched in surprise, finding her grandson standing in the doorway in an expectant kind of pose, both of his arms raised in confusion as he looked around.

"Hello, Seifer, darling," she acknowledged his predictably noisy return, although she was slightly taken aback by the obvious absence of the teen's mother. "Squall literally just left to get some coffee from the cafeteria."

"Oh," the blond retorted blankly, before striding to her bedside and nonchalantly plopping down in the chair that Squall had occupied mere minutes ago. "I see. Well, I'm not really surprised. He gets a lil funny around strangers sometimes, you know. He was probably uncomfortable in here with you all by himself."

"We talked for a bit. He seemed like he could hold his own," she amended gently, although Seifer's impression of the boy had spurred her mind to go wandering once more.

"You think he was upset over the drama we had going on? The whole thing was kinda lame, I guess. Way to make a first impression."

"No, I don't think he minded, honey."

"Well, good... and what about you?"

Shaking her head, the silver haired woman replied in a humored tone, "You know better than that, Seifer."

"Yeah," Seifer agreed with a brief snort of laughter, "I guess it'd be more of a shocker if Mom and I _weren't_ fighting for a change."

"You have a point, love. I do wonder sometimes if I will ever see you and your parents getting along."

"Yeah, well..."

Seifer lounged sideways in his chair, gesturing vaguely as his voice gradually faded into silence that was quite uncharacteristical for him. Emotions that were hard to define flickered across his face as Belle gazed upon him with affection. She knew of his bitterness, his natural need to rebel against the authoritarian way his parents had ordered him to live his young life. Seifer was loud-mouthed and usually spoke too much too soon with very little forethought, always conducting himself with a childish sort of arrogance that somehow never took away from his charm. His adolescent life had been more difficult than she had wished it for him, but he had always gotten by on luck and attitude. He was tall and physically imposing, compliments of countless grueling hours spent at the weight room of his gym, but she knew that his tough exterior was covering a sensitive, warm-hearted core – one that was much more vulnerable than the boy would ever admit. He had always been craving attention and validation that he would not receive from his parents... he had just never realized it.

'_Perhaps he finally found someone whose complexity matches that of his own.'_

"So," the blond eventually piped up, sounding casual and yet she knew better. "What do you think?"

She didn't have to guess what he was referring to, nor did she have to ask. With the corners of her lips curving into a smile, she answered cryptically, "... He is not what I would have expected from you."

"I figured you might say that," he chuckled in a low voice, scratching the back of his head. "Honestly, he's not what I would have expected from myself, either."

"A surprise all around, then," she concluded. "I think that's a good thing, love. Did you guys meet at school?"

"Yeah, we did. He's in some of my classes. We're both seniors, but he's a year younger than me."

"You didn't pick him up at a club like most of your other conquests, I see," Belle noted approvingly. "That's very good. I'm proud of you."

"I'm not so sure he's ever _seen _the inside of a club," the blond teen snorted, now crossing his right lower leg over his left knee as he leaned back in his chair to survey his grandmother more closely. Suddenly, as if something had struck him, his expression became unexpectedly serious and he leaned towards her. "Honestly. Tell me what you think."

There was a look on his face his grandmother had not seen much of over the past few years – a nearly innocent kind of hopefulness, and the urgent need to understand and be understood at the same time. He had never before asked her opinion on a boy, and this alone clued her in on how much the quiet, dark haired teenager named Squall truly meant to him.

Breathing a sigh as her thoughts scattered, she closed her eyes.

"Are you sure you want my honest opinion, love?"

He answered without hesitation.

"Of course I do."

Her thoughtful gaze found his curious emerald orbs across the meaningless distance that parted them. There was a small scowl between his eyes, and a certain tension to the way his strong, angular jaw was set.

Perhaps he wasn't ready for this – this deep immersion into an affection that was felt by more than just his body – but perhaps it was also the only thing in life he had ever truly needed.

"He is a very unique young man," the silver haired female started, her tone deliberately noncommittal. There was a terrible gravity to what she believed to have figured out about the dark haired boy, but she wasn't going to divulge her suspicions unless absolutely necessary. "Not particularly shy, but quiet, and very polite. Much more considerate and mature than most teenagers. Outrageously handsome, of course, but that, for one, I am sure I did not need to tell you. You've always been partial to the pretty ones."

"Yeah, I guess you have a point," he said with a wry grin, before his inflection became shaded with admiration. "I gotta admit, you're pretty spot on so far."

"He also seems more serious than he should be for his age," she continued, her words slowly gaining in significance. "There's a carefreeness typical for teenagers that he's... lacking."

"Yeah, he's pretty serious most of the time. Honestly, I think he had to grow up too fast. He'd kinda been the man of the house until a few years ago, when his mother got married, you know. His mom raised him all by herself, so he's really protective of her and his younger sister."

She gazed at him intensely, knowing that it was unusual for Seifer to get involved in his lovers' past tribulations. In certain ways, the blond had always been much too shallow and much too unbothered by the humanity of others. She'd never seen him get emotionally attached - until today.

"Seifer. Do you care about that boy as much as I think you do?" she asked calmly.

"I think it's a lot more than just that," Seifer admitted truthfully.

"Remember, there's a big difference between being attracted and being in love, Seifer," she lectured him wisely, although she could tell that he had already figured out as much on his own.

He validated her impression by nodding quite seriously. "Yeah. I know."

The brawny blond suddenly picked up on the indecision lingering in her pure blue eyes – the natural wish to want nothing but the best for her grandson, and the terrifying knowledge that what she was about to tell him might turn his life upside down.

"Hey, come out with it already," he teased her, sounding far more lighthearted than he felt. "What's on your mind?"

"Seifer," she ultimately uttered his name, before picking her following words with utmost caution, "I was wondering... Do you happen to know... if Squall has ever been seen by a psychologist?"

"Huh? No, not that I know of. Why would you ask that?" he answered, looking honestly baffled as he straightened up in his chair. When his grandmother continued to gaze back at him with silent implication, he added with a jerk of his shoulders, "Well, I mean, he's seen _you._"

"I'm retired, sweetheart," she corrected him demurely. "That doesn't count. Besides, we were merely making conversation."

"I don't think that's a gift you can really _retire_, grandma," he retorted cleverly. "Seriously. What's going on? You've always been fantastic at reading people, whether you're just making conversation or not. I want to know what you're thinking. You look like something's up."

Inclining her head towards her chest slightly, she murmured contemplatively, "Seifer, honey, I don't know him well, and we really haven't spoken much. I don't want to worry you needlessly. Perhaps I'm jumping to conclusions. I might be getting rusty on my old days."

"I doubt that," he interjected, making a grimace of disagreement. "But okay, fair enough... I get that you barely spent five minutes with him, so what would you like to know? I'm sure I can probably tell you."

Despite her hesitation to share her professional opinion on Squall with her grandson, Belle was fully aware that Seifer was neither oblivious, nor stupid. Obviously, he had already picked up on a few bits and pieces of his brunette companion's complicated psychological frame... at this point, it was likely just a matter of helping him complete the puzzle.

"... Have you guys spent the night together?" she finally asked, looking him straight in the eye.

"Uh... well, I mean, uh... yeah," he admitted in a stretched tone of voice. For some reason, he felt oddly embarrassed discussing the finer details of his relationship with her. It wasn't something he had much experience with, considering he had never before felt the need to investigate his lovers with her.

"Okay, great. Does it seem to you that he normally sleeps pretty well?"

"No, not really, I suppose," Seifer denied, scratching his head. "I've seen him have nightmares a few times, and it usually takes him a while to fall asleep. He really doesn't sleep much from what I can tell."

"I see," she said, obviously processing that information, before seemingly moving on. "We've already talked a bit about his personality, but what else can you tell me?"

"Anything you wanna know."

"Well... does Squall seem to get angry pretty easily? Do you get the impression that he's overly vigilant when there's no need to be? And does he seem to have excessive mood swings?"

"Yeah... Shit. That sounds like Squall alright..." the blond grunted, not liking where this was going. His grandmother was repeating things he had already hashed out on his own, and yet they sounded more serious when she was reciting them back to him. "He has one hell of a temper. It doesn't take much to set him off. No offense and all, but he's got worse mood swings than a damn woman. He's really skittish, all the time... about everything. And I've seen him freak out more than just once."

"I see. Does he seem physically affectionate at all?"

"Uh... Well... he's pretty affectionate with his mother and his sister. He's kinda weird about being touchy-feely with me. He always seems a little awkward and uncomfortable, almost like he doesn't want to be touched, or doesn't know what to do. But, I mean, I'm the first guy he ever dated, so I guess it makes sense he wouldn't be as comfortable with it as I am."

"I understand."

"Where are you going with all of this?" Seifer asked, gesturing at her questioningly. "Look, I know he's a lil weird sometimes, and I'm probably making him sound worse than he is, but he's definitely not crazy or anything."

"I wasn't trying to say he was crazy at all, sweetheart," she reassured him. "Not that 'crazy' is a particularly professional or considerate term, especially in my field, you know."

"Yeah, I know," he admitted, sounding contrite. "Sorry."

"That's alright. I know you don't mean anything malicious by it," the woman replied with a patient smile, before shaking her head. "Look, as far as Squall is concerned, he's obviously functioning quite effectively in society, and he seems fairly well-adjusted to me. Somebody spent great care raising him. There's no doubt he's a smart, prudent kid."

"_But_?" the blond added poignantly.

"But... I also think he's a lot more damaged than you realize," she said quietly.

"Eh? Why would you think that?" Seifer asked, raising his brows. "Damaged? What do you even mean by that, 'damaged'?"

She paused ever so briefly, before calmly elaborating, "I mean that he's showing classical signs of someone who has dealt with significant psychological or physical trauma in the past. He's clearly learned to hide these signs, and hide them well at that, but they're there, nonetheless."

"What? Really? What kinda signs are you talking about?" he pried impatiently, and she could tell that the topic was bothering him.

"Well, it's complicated, and there is no cookie cutter formula to determine what a person should act like, of course. It's psychology, love, not science. But... I can tell you that from what I've seen so far, Squall appears to be abnormally mistrusting and on edge. He also seems to feel overly responsible and guilty for things that aren't his fault," she summarized her brief impression of the brunette, noting that Seifer's eyes were nearly burning a hole into hers. "The things you've told me about his sleeping habits, his mood swings and his disinterest in physical affection are also clues that he isn't your ordinary teenager. Emotional scars tend to shade people's actions and behavior. That boy internalizes everything around him. There is a reason he's acting that way."

"Like what?"

"It's not something that's easily figured out, I'm afraid," Belle explained to her grandson with an apologetic expression. "His body language suggests that he trusts you, but I don't think he's about to tell you what's bothering him, either. Frankly, I don't think he's about to tell _anyone_."

"What do you think is wrong with him?" Seifer questioned, desperate to find an explanation for the shadier aspects of Squall's behavior. He considered to mention the fact that his friend was a cutter, but figured it wiser not to reveal just how mentally unstable the boy truly was. He was afraid of it ruining the way Squall would be perceived by his family, or worse yet, how breaching the boy's fragile trust would affect their budding relationship.

"I can only guess, especially since I hardly know him," she mused, before she cast down her eyes with a grave expression. "Considering his age and everything you've told me about him, I think... that there is a distinct possibility he's dealt with physical or sexual abuse in the past."

He stared at her, his face immobile as granite. Something dark and violent was flickering behind his emerald green eyes, which he had inherited from his mother, just as much as he had inherited her sometimes scorching temper.

"I'm sorry, Seifer," she apologized. "I know that's not an easy thing to hear."

"Some guys at school tried to rape him today," the blond abruptly confided, the hatred curling his features becoming entirely predominant. "Trust me. I know _exactly _what you're talking about."

"That explains the terrible bruises," she sighed, but Seifer heard no acquiescence in her clear, melodious voice. "That poor thing. However, as traumatizing as that must have been for him, I don't think this issue is simply a day old, Seifer. Whatever he's dealing with has been around for much longer than that."

"You're absolutely right," the blond agreed. "I think he's been having problems with those bastards for a long time."

"What kind of problems?"

"Something to do with Squall's stepfather," Seifer growled. "Some weird grudge one of the dudes at school is holding. It's not even Squall's fault. He's done nothing wrong. He is a good fucking guy. Straight A student. Works his ass off after school. Super protective of his family. Honestly, he's the kinda kid that Mom would flip for."

"... You said Squall has a stepfather?" his grandmother inquired with curiosity.

"Yeah. His family is complicated as fuck."

"You're not the first to tell me that," Belle responded with a meek smile.

"Squall didn't meet his real father until a few days ago. The dude seems alright, but Squall's stepfather? Yeah, not so much. The guy's a total dick. All in all, though, he doesn't seem any worse than _my_ old man – no offense."

Shaking her silver haired head, she refused to pour oil into a fire that had been raging between her son and her grandson for too many years. Her only child, Alexander, was a man of numerous skills and talents, but being a good father had unfortunately never been one of them. She had tried, for a while, to engage the man in his son's life, until she had been forced to realize that it wasn't something he had ever truly been interested in. Seifer had been nothing more to the successful physician than a box to check off on his list of things to accomplish in life – buy a house, get married, produce an heir to the family name, that sort of thing.

Needless to say, Seifer's bisexual tendencies had not exactly been part of the man's plan.

"Seifer," she finally cleared her throat with his name, which had been passed down to him from his great-grandfather, "Please keep in mind that I might be wrong about all of this. I'm a psychologist, not a mind reader, and we have been known to be wrong, on occasion. I do think, however, that you should definitely keep a close eye on Squall. I can tell he means a lot to you, and if I'm right about what's been done to him, the effects on the boy could be devastating if he doesn't get help dealing with it... or, worse, if the abuse is an ongoing thing. There is something that isn't right with him, but the reason for his behavior might be so close in front of you that you and his family can't see it."

"I understand," her hardheaded grandson declared sternly, looking so much more mature as he sat there by her side, folding his arms against his chest. "I'll figure it out, trust me on that."

"I recommend that you don't tell him what I used to do for a living. If I'm right about him, he might not be so inclined to talk to me again after he finds out."

"Yeah, you're probably right. I won't mention it to him."

"I hope to see more of him. I admit, he is a refreshing change from your run of the mill club kids that you used to bring around," she said, the reprimand in her voice barely more than playful. "As for your mother... give her time. If you intend on keeping Squall around, she will make an effort to get to know him, if only because she hates to be out of the loop on things. She loves you, and I do think she will appreciate how different this boy is from your former romantic conquests."

"Maybe, but at the end of the day, she'll never get over me being bi," the blond mumbled grudgingly.

"Perhaps not," Belle agreed with brutal honesty. "But I do think she will learn to live with it."

"Yeah... don't be mad if I'm not holding on too tight to that thought."

"I wouldn't expect you to," she said graciously.

"So, I was wondering," Seifer piped up, the pitch of his voice noticeably altered, "Is it alright if Squall and I stay at your place tonight?"

"Oh, of course, love, but don't you want to stay at home while you're here? You don't visit very often."

"And be under the same roof with my mother _and_ my boyfriend?" he countered dryly. "Hell no. I'm kind of emotionally attached to my sanity."

Shaking her head at him lightly, she replied, "Well, it's alright by me, love. You still have your key, right?"

"Sure I do. Thanks, grandma."

"You're welcome, darling. By the way, speaking of your mother... where is she at, anyway?"

"She went outside to smoke," the brawny teen grinned. "I think I ruffled her feathers quite a bit. She really makes it so damn easy, I can never help myself. She said I was going to be the death of her, and I told her to hurry up and get on with it. We're burning daylight and my inheritance here."

"Oh, Seifer," the silver haired woman sighed, but kept the remainder of her lecture to herself. She knew that this was a difficult situation, both for Seifer and his high-strung mother. Perhaps he was right and the woman would never come to terms with her son's sexuality, but regardless, Belle hoped that the two would at least accomplish some kind of truce.

They loved each other, after all, no matter how much they might both deny it.

"I think you should take Squall home," the blond's grandmother finally suggested, tenderly grabbing Seifer's much larger hand. "I appreciate that you both came by to check on me, but the poor thing looked like he could barely stand. Let him get some sleep. I should be out of here by morning. We can have brunch together."

"Yeah, you're probably right," Seifer agreed somewhat reluctantly, before leaning forward and placing a kiss on her cheek. "I'm really glad you're okay. I was worried about you."

"Don't worry about me, love," she smiled. "Go home now, get some rest. There are some of your favorite cookies in the jar on the kitchen counter, by the way."

"Sweet!" he exclaimed, looking beyond excited, and for a moment, she saw the little boy in him that he rarely showed these days. Of course, very few culinary concoctions had a place in his heart as big his grandmother's famous oatmeal chocolate chip cookies did. "Thanks! You're awesome."

"Don't mention it, love."

"Anyway, I'll see you tomorrow," the teen muttered affectionately as he stood from his chair and beamed down at her. "I love you."

"And I, you."

He smiled at her familiar words of adoration, realizing that although his life had never been particularly easy, he had also been fortunate beyond measure. It was something he would often be too stubborn or proud to appreciate, but not tonight. Tonight, he knew that he was truly lucky to be blessed with a grandmother that would bake cookies for him, dry his tears, search his closet for monsters, rock him to sleep at three in the morning and sing him songs that had been forever burned into his sometimes emotionally challenged heart. She cherished him and his happiness more than she valued her own life, and her concern for him also extended towards those that he cared for – even moody, difficult, antisocial brunette train wrecks like Squall. She alone had made him capable of loving another human being, and right now, he was planning on doing exactly that...

Loving the one moody, difficult, antisocial, completely fucking amazing person in his life that he had never honestly thought he deserved.

* * *

The term **clairvoyance** (from 17th century French with _clair_ meaning "clear" and _voyance_ meaning "vision") is used to refer to the ability to gain information about an object, person, location or physical event through means other than the known human senses, a form of extra-sensory perception. A person said to have the ability of clairvoyance is referred to as a **clairvoyant** ("one who sees clearly"). [Wikipedia]

"Clairvoyant Disease" is a song by Avenged Sevenfold. A lot of my titles come from songs, in case you hadn't noticed yet.

Needless to say, I'm not a psychologist, so please don't be too harsh with me where Seifer's granny is concerned. I've taken some college level psychology classes and done some research, but that's about the extent of it. I don't consider myself an expert in the field by any means. Also, I'm always a little surprised by some readers thinking Squall's abuse is impossible to miss and everybody should be picking up on it pretty much instantaneously. Squall has some pretty substantial psychological issues, of course, he clearly doesn't get along with his father and he's a virgin (presumably, obviously we know better) who gets freaked out by sex, but does that inevitably mean he's getting abused? I personally don't think it's that simple, but do feel free to correct me if you think I'm wrong :) I always enjoy a good discussion.

As always, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I know the hospital setting is getting a bit repetitive (at least I'm getting tired of writing about it), but the next chapter will be in a different setting, promise.

I hope you're all doing well and I wish you much happiness over the holidays! Merry Christmas!


	36. The Price of Freedom

-:-

**Chapter 36  
****The Price of Freedom**

"_You're a good person. You deserve to be treated that way."_

-:-

You've been known to say

That you're a-okay

When you're feeling sick inside

I just want you to know

I got no place to go

Til the day you die.

"_While You're Waiting" – Alkaline Trio_

-:-

"It's snowing even here..."

With a look of surprise, Seifer glanced at his brunette companion, who was trudging through the ankle-deep snow that covered his grandmother's front yard with a frown tarnishing his handsome features. Squall hadn't spoken a word to him since they had left the hospital, and the blond had wisely left him in peace. Squall's shaggy brown hair looked darker against the pure white that surrounded them, but his skin didn't seem to offer much contrast. His grey-blue eyes were shadowed with some kind of burden that Squall would not share with him or the rest of the world. For some reason, Seifer couldn't shake the feeling that something about the brunette had changed today, although he couldn't even begin to guess what it was.

"Yeah, it doesn't normally snow this early around here," Seifer mused in a neutral voice as they approached his grandmother's house, which was nestled amongst a group of enormous trees in a small inlet on Balamb Island. There was a boat pier out in the backyard, hosting his grandfather's latest sailboat acquisition. The house that was made entirely out of dark red brick was generously sized, obviously built with children and grandchildren in mind. Seifer himself had his very own room to call his own, and he knew from experience that not a thing about it had changed since he had left it a few months ago.

"Your grandparents have a nice house," Squall said in a quiet monotone as they came to a halt at the front door, his words a transparent attempt at being kind. He was shoving his hands into the pockets of Seifer's oversized black fleece jacket that he had been forced to wear and dropped his head, causing a few snowflakes to fall from his hair.

"Oh yeah, it's great," the blond agreed with a nod as he was searching his coat pocket for his keys. He was holding a plastic bag in his left hand, which contained a few random items he had picked up at a gas station along the way. "My parents' house is kinda like yours, ya know – way too big. You'd think there were like twenty people living there, seriously. I like it much better here. This is my real home right here."

Squall stared at some point on the snow to his feet without saying a word, his expression stone cold. Seifer had learned by now that Squall's silence was often much more meaningful than the things he actually said out loud, and it only fueled the nagging sensation he'd felt in the pit of his stomach since talking to Belle back in her hospital room.

'_There is something not right with you... But what is it? What on earth are you hiding from me, and why?'_

He gazed upon his friend's exquisite profile, his green eyes distant as the thoughts inside his head became louder, until the lean framed brunette suddenly flicked up his head and stared back at him.

"What?" Squall grunted as he kicked his toes into a pile of snow and tucked his arms underneath his shoulders. The sight made Seifer realize that the brunette had to be freezing, and that he was probably a lot more uncomfortable than he was letting on. Therefore, he chose to shake his head evasively in response.

"Nothing. Sorry about that."

Seifer pushed the front door open and quickly ushered Squall inside. Their boots were noisy on the dark wood flooring that covered the front hallway, but other than that, the house was completely silent. Seifer rushed to flip the first light switch he could find, then proceeded through the house to illuminate the living room, kitchen and the narrow staircase that led to the second floor. Antique furniture, expensive oriental rugs, stained glass lamps and countless family portraits made his grandparents' home appear cozy and welcoming – just the way he had remembered it.

"Come on," Seifer shouted eagerly as he dropped his plastic bag on a black granite counter in the kitchen and threw his jacket on a nearby chair. As soon as he heard Squall approaching from the hallway, Seifer made a beeline for his grandmother's cookie jar.

"_Nice,_" the blond whistled appreciatively as his hand dove in and retrieved two chunky, palm-sized oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Looking excited, he watched how his friend ambled into the room, wearing nothing but socks, khaki pants, a hospital scrub top and an absent-minded expression.

"Here, have a cookie!" Seifer ordered as he strode up to his companion with determination and thrust the cookie into his face. Squall, however, merely took a half-step back, looking annoyed.

"No, thanks," he refused gruffly, angling his head to the side.

"Hey, look, these are my grandma's famous oatmeal cookies, alright? You don't turn those down. They're the best ones you'll ever have, I promise. Now have one."

A few short weeks ago, Squall would have most likely socked Seifer square in the face for having the balls to boss him around, but part of him had since then come to understand that the blond was simply watching out for him in his own, charmingly bothersome way. On top of that, Squall genuinely respected the blond's grandmother, who had treated him with so much kindness, and he suddenly felt obligated to at least sample the woman's allegedly 'famous' cooking.

"Fine," he grunted coldly, swiping the cookie from Seifer's grasp with a scowl before turning away. Honestly, Squall really disliked sweets of any kind, but homemade cookies (along with hot chocolate) just happened to be one of the few sugary treats he actually enjoyed. He had devoured a cup of coffee and a granola bar at the hospital cafeteria earlier, and frankly, the small snack had only ended up making him hungrier. The only square meal he had eaten today had been lunch from Ward's Diner, and said meal hadn't exactly stayed in his system for very long.

_'Yeah... because I threw it up all over Deling City High property.'_

Squall felt a creepy, antsy tingling sensation blowing across his skin as he was forced to remember Jeff's assault on him at school, and for a moment, there was a sour taste rising in the back of his throat once more.

'_Stop. Just stop. It's over. Nothing happened. Get a hold of yourself. You're being pathetic.'_

"You want anything to drink?" Seifer asked as he languidly watched Squall walking up to the glass door that led to the large balcony outside, which overlooked the backyard and the ocean.

"No."

As Squall stood by the floor length windows and glared into the darkness of a cold Balamb night, denying a whole _world_ of memories that Seifer would never know, he didn't even feel the blond's eyes on him. Seifer was silently roving every inch of his wounded body with his gaze – he patiently studied the brunette's stiff posture, his subtly rising back and the fine, dark strands of hair that followed the sweeping curve of the nape of his neck. The dark haired boy really was as outrageously handsome as his grandmother had noted, and the brunette's body looked perfect to Seifer, despite the cuts and scars and the fact that Squall could have easily used another ten pounds to his name.

'_You are so ridiculously fuckin' hot. Jesus. How the hell am I supposed to keep my hands off you?'_

Suddenly, something lit up in Seifer's eyes. He whipped around on the spot and disappeared, before returning moments later with Squall's boots.

"Here," he drawled as he dropped them by Squall's feet with a thud. "Put those back on for a minute."

The brunette regarded him with an air of confusion, until Seifer brushed past him with a half-eaten cookie stuck in his mouth and proceeded to maneuver the balcony door open.

"Let's go outside for a bit," Seifer mumbled between bites. "There's a heater out there. I'll turn it on in a sec. It'll get warm in no time."

"You have a heated balcony?" Squall asked, sounding as baffled as he looked.

"Yup. It's my grandparents' favorite spot. They like to sit out there all year around, sip brandy and watch the boats coming in to Balamb."

Tilting his head in an adorably puzzled manner, Squall watched how Seifer expertly touched a few buttons on a panel by the door, before stepping outside. The brunette hesitated for a second, not entirely convinced by the idea of hanging out on a balcony in the middle of the night, but then his curiosity clearly got the best of him. He jabbed his own cookie between his teeth, slipped into his boots and haphazardly laced them up.

"Come on, slowpoke, I'm not getting any younger out here," he heard Seifer's supposed siren call, the taunting words dominated by near childish impatience. With a snort, Squall proceeded to follow the blond outside, although he made a mental note to himself to kick Seifer in the nuts for being such a royal pain in the ass.

He was engulfed by a strange draft of both cool and warm air as his feet finally crossed the wood paneled balcony floor. His eyes were immediately drawn to the dark, shimmering waters that were only a meaningless distance away, just beyond the edge of Belle Almasy's expertly landscaped and snow covered backyard. The moon was still bright, drenching everything around them into a pale, washed out light. Seifer was standing a few feet away from him, leaning with his back against the railing as he watched Squall's approach.

"Nice out here, isn't it?" Seifer asked, a strange tint to his inflection that Squall couldn't quite decipher. The dark haired boy stopped next to the blond, although he was facing the opposite direction, towards the sea. He could make out the twinkling lights of Balamb's harbor across the inlet, and a ship horn that was blown far off in the distance of the night.

"Yeah," Squall agreed eventually, resting his elbows upon the balustrade as he started to chew on his cookie, savoring its rich sweetness as it melted on his tongue.

"I'm really glad you're here with me, you know."

Seifer was smiling at Squall when the brunette gave him his typical, skeptical side-eye. When the older boy's warm grin didn't falter, the dark haired teenager finally blew out a breath and muttered reluctantly, "Yeah. Me too."

As the blond continued to beam at his friend happily, he inched closer to him out of instinct, brushing his elbow against Squall's in a small gesture of affection. They stood that way for a while, with Seifer almost crowding the other boy against the railing, before the blond eventually asked in a casual tone, "By the way... did you ever call your mother?"

Moving around awkwardly in his position, as if the question made him uncomfortable, Squall answered stiffly, "Yeah. I called her while I was at the cafeteria."

"That's good," Seifer acknowledged with a pleased nod. "Did you call Laguna, too?"

"... No."

"Why not?"

Seifer kept his inquiry free of judgment, but his eyes were full of curiosity as they traced Squall's frame from top to bottom. Shrugging, the brunette leaned further across the railing, causing his hair to fall into his face. He seemed to fumble with his own thoughts for a bit, until his features inevitably dragged into a frown.

"There was no point," he replied flatly. "She was at the hospital with him when I called her."

"... Oh."

His explanation elicited a different kind of smirk from Seifer, and Squall wasn't sure how much he liked that particular reaction. Frustrated with the situation back home in Deling City, the brunette begun to rub the bridge of his nose with his thumb, when an unexpected notion suddenly crossed his mind seemingly out of nowhere.

"Hey, is Shiva going to be okay at your apartment all on her own?" Squall asked as he looked up, and Seifer noticed that concern had crept into his voice.

"Yeah, she's fine," the blond reassured him. "I have a sitter who takes her out and feeds her when I'm not around for whatever reason."

Squall nodded absently, and his voice drifted off as he murmured quietly, "I... I got Griever from here a few years ago."

"Really? You mean your dog, Griever? You got him from Balamb?" Seifer said with a tone of genuine surprise. He hadn't expected Squall to freely share such a touchy part of his past with him, especially since the other boy had looked so uneasy mere seconds ago, when Seifer had questioned him about his mother.

'_I guess things really have changed. He isn't nearly as ridiculously guarded as he used to be. Well... at least sometimes, anyway.'_

"Yeah," Squall interrupted his companion's musing. He was fidgeting with the bandages around his wrists, tugging at them here and there as if they irritated him. "Well, I mean, technically it was my mom. She got him for me."

"I see," Seifer acknowledged simply. He knew well enough that Squall was still sore over his dog's death, and he honestly felt sorry for the brunette, but the topic of Balamb had suddenly elicited his interest in a different kind of form. "Hey, don't your grandparents live out here, too?"

There was a twitch by the corner of Squall's lips when Seifer asked that question, and the dark haired teen shifted in his stance. Finally, he bit with a soft snarl, "I don't have any grandparents."

Scratching his head with a dumbfounded expression, the blond retorted, "Well, technically you do."

"No, I don't."

"Quit being so stubborn," Seifer said, sounding exasperate. "If you ask me, I really think you should find them and—"

"_Stop_."

Seifer couldn't help but raise a brow at Squall's sharp, commanding tone and the way he suddenly pitched his head back to stare at the blond with grey eyes that seared through him like daggers. Honestly, Seifer didn't understand the other boy's mindset at all; one minute Squall would deliberately divulge painful details of his past, and the next he'd look like he wanted to cut the blond to ribbons for daring to ask about his family.

"But your mother said that—" Seifer made another stubborn attempt at bringing up the topic of the boy's grandparents, before Squall cut him off once more.

"I _know _what my mother said. I'm not an idiot," he hissed. "This is my decision, not yours. Don't ever forget that."

Squall was speaking in a harsh, semi-threatening voice, apparently hell bent on shredding Seifer's foolish determination. As frustrating as the older blond found the hardheaded brunette's abrasive and unpredictable behavior to be, he had to accept the fact that he couldn't _make_ Squall talk about anything. Truthfully, he was only trying to help his dark haired companion in dealing with his messed up past, but he couldn't know that, at this point, discussing _anything_ related to his family was bringing Squall nothing but misery.

In all essence, the brunette had mentally broken down hours ago, and it took everything he had in him just to keep it together.

"... You're right."

Squall blinked when Seifer abruptly reached out and gently brushed his knuckles across his pale, bruised left cheek, before pushing himself off the railing and walking back inside the house. Confused by the unexpected tenderness of that gesture and the blond's placid, accommodating demeanor, Squall remained folded up against the balustrade with a blank expression. He didn't even move a single muscle until he suddenly found Seifer returning from the kitchen, carrying a lighter and a pack of cigarettes.

The sight almost instantly caused the frown to return to the brunette's slack features.

"You smoke?" Squall clipped as he monitored Seifer striding towards the center of the balcony, where he shook a single cigarette out of the pack and arranged it between his lips.

"Sometimes," Seifer admitted with an offhanded melody to his voice as he lit his cigarette and inhaled a mouthful of smoke. Then, his eyes found Squall's, and he was taken aback by the charring glare he saw in the brunette's nearly pitch black orbs. Straightening up, Seifer lowered his arms and gestured questioningly. "What? Why? What of it?"

The brunette continued to give him a cold, hostile stare that was glinting with something Seifer did not understand, before he suddenly yanked his head around and snarled, "Whatever."

Perplexed, Seifer watched how the brunette stepped away from the edge of the balcony and tried to push past him, back into the kitchen. It took the blond a mere second to catalogue the pissed off look on Squall's face, before he reached out and grabbed the retreating brunette's arm, jerking him back.

"Squall, hey!" Seifer addressed the brunette demandingly as he pulled him closer and angled himself down to his level of height. "What the hell?"

The brunette only screwed up his face and hissed, "Let go."

"No. Talk to me."

"Let go, because I promise you'll regret it if you don't," the brunette ordered in a voice that was frosty and dripping with spite, while he was swiping the blond's hand a poignant glare. He could feel Seifer's breath brushing across his skin, and when it hit his nostrils, the brunette grimaced visibly.

"No," Seifer denied again, unimpressed by his classmate's malicious attitude. "Seriously, what's the matter?"

"I want you to quit touching me, that's the matter!"

"Is it because of _this_?" the blond added in a tone of disbelief as he held the lit cigarette closer to Squall's face in demonstration, causing the pale brunette to recoil.

"Get that the fuck away from me," Squall sniped, the words grating with something Seifer could have only described as deeply seated disgust.

With a stunned expression, Seifer immediately curled back his hand and flicked the cigarette away from Squall and onto the ground, where its bright orange light fizzled and died in the snow.

"I didn't know that it bothers you," the eighteen year old declared, sounding genuinely astounded. As he watched his companion and continued to hold on to his arm, he noticed how tense Squall looked and felt. The brunette was avoiding his eyes now, but Seifer could tell that Squall had been affected by the revelation of his occasional smoking habit on a much more profound level than any ordinary non-smoker might have been.

"Squall," Seifer intently whispered the brunette's name as he steadily inched the reluctant boy closer. "What is it?"

"Nothing!" the boy snapped evasively, trying to back away from the blond's touch. "I just hate the smell."

"It's more than that," Seifer immediately disagreed. "It's all over your fucking face. It _really_ bothers you. Why is that?"

"It's disgusting."

"Fine, fair enough, I'll give you that one, but I know that's not the only reason you're acting this way. I mean, seriously, who do you even know that smokes? We both know _I've_ never smoked around you before. I really only do it once in a blue moon, anyway. So what's going on here?"

When Squall didn't answer this time, Seifer could tell that he was on to something.

"Your mom doesn't smoke, right?" the blond inquired, although the question was merely rhetorical in nature.

"No."

"What about your stepfather? Does he smoke?"

The brunette hesitated for a split second too long before answering, causing all kinds of warning lights to trip inside Seifer's mind.

"He smokes cigars," Squall admitted reluctantly, his eyes flickering as they dipped towards the snow to his feet. Seifer didn't say anything this time; he merely continued to survey Squall's sharp, finely cut features that looked so tight and angry now. The brunette remained that way for a minute, before he suddenly hunched his shoulders and cocked his chin back up into the air, almost as if he was trying to pull himself together.

"You stink," the brunette informed his opposite cruelly, abruptly trying to maneuver his arm out of Seifer's hand. "I'm going inside."

"Wait," Seifer interjected hastily, firming his grasp on Squall once more. "I have to ask you something."

"I said you stink," Squall tossed back the blond's request without consideration. "It's annoying the fuck out of me."

"Squall."

There was a certain gravity to the way Seifer had ground out his name, causing Squall to pause and look up at him in alarm. He didn't like the stern, unyielding urgency he saw in the blond's emerald green orbs, nor did he like the question that now rolled off the older boy's tongue.

"... Why do you hate your stepfather?"

"W-What?" the brunette stuttered, and his face seemed to acquire an even more impressive shade of bloodless.

"You heard what I asked," Seifer said evenly, ignoring the boy snorting at him in response.

"I don't 'hate' my stepfather," Squall countered. "I never said that."

"You didn't have to," the other boy answered in an unimpressed tone. "I can tell just by looking at you when you talk about him. I've always been able to tell. You really hate that guy."

"No, I don't!" Squall barked, his eyes narrow now as they carved right through Seifer with the cutting power of scalpels. "Shut up and listen to the fucking words coming out of my mouth! That can't be _that_ much to ask."

"Fine. You talk, and I'll listen to what you say," Seifer growled, tilting his head as he brought his face closer to Squall's, searching every inch of the brunette's features with incredible seriousness. Finally, his green eyes became dark, and his voice even darker. "Squall. What the hell did your stepfather do to you?"

"What? What the _fuck_ are you talking about?" Squall hissed, looking repulsed. "Are you mental?"

"I'm asking what the hell your stepfather has done to you," Seifer elaborated, although he knew that Squall had understood the question perfectly well. "Has he ever hit you or done anything else to you he shouldn't be doing?"

"Of course not!" the brunette shot back, looking genuinely disturbed now. Seifer could feel his muscles shaking under his fingertips. "What's the fucking matter with you?"

Shaking his head, Seifer countered, "I don't believe you."

"I don't give two shits what you believe!" Squall screeched back in outrage.

"So you'd have no problem swearing to me on your _sister's life_ that your stepfather has never laid a hand on you?" Seifer responded with calculated intimidation. He knew he was pushing his boundaries, but he had realized by now that Squall would never divulge whatever it was he was hiding from him while he had his guard up. Unfortunately, one of the very few effective ways he had found to keep Squall from walling himself in was to strike some kind of nerve and piss the brunette off to a point where he was no longer paying full attention to what he was saying.

"You are a fucking _asshole_," Squall spat. "You are way out of fucking line! Get your damn hands off me right now!"

"Yeah? So you can run away like you always do? Fuck that. No. You look at me right now and you _swear_ on your little sister's life that Kato has never hit you, and I'll let you go. But not a minute sooner."

"Piss off! Who do you think you are? I don't have to explain anything to you!"

"You can't do it, can you?" Seifer taunted, his inflection decorated with triumph that was driving his younger companion up the wall. "Because I'm right, aren't I?"

"No! Fuck you, Almasy! _Fuck _you! You don't know anything!"

"You can't do it, Squall. I knew it. I fuckin' knew it."

"Who the fuck cares if he hits me or not!" Squall suddenly caterwauled, nearly succeeding in breaking Seifer's grasp as he violently tried to snatch back his arm. "You have no right to talk about my sister that way, you fucking dick!"

"'_Who the fuck cares'_? Really? Are you fuckin' serious?" the blond groaned, now grabbing Squall's chin and jaw with his right hand and twisting it around towards him roughly. "_I _care! You hear me? Do you hear the words coming out of _my_ mouth? I care! I fuckin' _love_ you, you dumb little shit! Wrap your goddamn pissy fuckin' mind around _that_, will you?"

Clearly disrupted by Seifer's impassioned speech, Squall stopped and stared for a moment, trying to keep the emotions boiling in his heart from flooding to the surface. He was so angry, so hurt, and so scared. Part of him wanted to strangle Seifer, while another wanted to stop being so stupidly strong all the time and scream as loud as he could, just so the noise inside his own head would finally die down.

Instead, Squall did neither of those things. Swallowing down his pride and fury, the brunette gritted his teeth and sighed, "Kato doesn't do anything to me. I'm fine, okay?"

"No, you're not," Seifer denied coldly as he released the other boy's chin. "You know, at this point, I don't give a lick of a shit if you lie to me, but you need to quit lying to _yourself_. You're only making things worse."

"Look, I don't know where all of this crazy shit you're talking about comes from, but it has nothing to do with me! There's not a damn thing wrong with me or my family!"

"Really? Are you serious? Have you been bullshitting yourself for so long that you actually _believe_ it now?" Seifer barked, rolling his eyes. Deep down, he knew he was getting carried away and that, perhaps, he was in no position to attack Squall without valid proof, but in the end, this wasn't a topic he could discuss without getting emotional.

"Shut up, you self-righteous fuck!" the brunette screamed back. "You don't know your ass from a fucking hole in the ground, you hear me?"

"I know that there's something you're not telling me. You hate your stepfather, and I want to know why that is."

"I don't hate my stepfather, alright! Fucking Christ, are you fucking deaf?"

"Right. You don't hate him. Whatever you say, Squall," the blond said dryly, his lips writhing with sarcasm.

"Fuck you, alright!"

"... Do you love him?"

Blinking, the brunette took a quick breath and said, "What?"

"Do you love your stepfather?"

Seifer saw it – the flash that lit up briefly in Squall's haunted eyes as his mind was desperately digging for some kind of answer that _wasn't _the truth. Before the brunette had a chance to respond, Seifer said grimly, "Tell me. Don't try to make up some kind of excuse. Just _tell me_."

Looking like the typical deer-in-the-headlights, Squall stammered, "... I..."

"You _don't_ love him, do you," the blond deducted, sounding both satisfied and saddened at the same time. "And I bet you have a very good reason for that."

"Shut up," his opposite ordered harshly. Seifer could see the brunette's Adam's apple bobbing as he forced himself to swallow, and Squall was no longer blinking as his eyes stared straight through him.

"He's done something to you, hasn't he? What is it? Does he beat you? Is that it?"

"When have you ever seen a single mark on me, you moron?" Squall snapped with an exasperate, impatient kind of fury, again attempting to break Seifer's grip on his body without avail. Semiconsciously, the blond wondered why the other boy continued to even bother trying. Their differences in brute strength had clearly been demonstrated a long time ago. "You're getting carried away with this dramatic bullshit!"

"I've seen the scars on your wrists, Squall," Seifer noted darkly, cutting his gaze down to his friend's forearms, which he was now considering in a much different light than before. "Was that really you? Or did _he _do this?"

"Yeah, it was me, you fucking dick! Do you wanna see how I do it? Huh? Would you like me to show you?"

Clearly not prepared for that kind of response, Seifer gasped, "Squall..."

"Is that what you want?" the dark haired boy challenged, but despite the flare of hostility raging in his eyes, there was a raw, wounded edge to his voice that didn't elude Seifer's attention.

"No. Of course not," the blond answered in a hushed tone as he tried to de-escalate the situation and shook his head. "I just want to help you."

"Then quit assuming shit, and don't talk about things you know nothing about, because I will drop you like a bad habit if you keep this shit up, and I won't think twice about it, I promise you."

"Squall—"

"By the way, why don't we talk about _you_ for a minute here, huh?" the brunette hissed as a nasty sneer suddenly curled his lips and he lowered his voice to a particularly wounding level. "Why are _you _such a royal dipshit, Seifer Almasy? Did your old man beat _you_, huh? Is that why you're such a fuck up? Did he beat your stupid ass?"

"... Yeah. He did."

The moment Seifer's quiet, emotionless response filled the insignificant space between them, Squall's face went blank. The blond saw him freezing up as his blue eyes lost the revulsion and wrath they had harbored only seconds before. Almost instantly, the familiar shadow of guilt fell over the brunette's features, and his voice cracked when he whispered in shock, "W-what?"

"It's true. My father beat the snot out of me when I was growing up. He would pick up his belt in a heartbeat. Wouldn't even lecture me or anything, he'd just go to town," Seifer explained calmly, noticing the pure, unguarded horror in Squall's face. It was then that he understood that maybe this wasn't a scenario the brunette was familiar with, after all. "I'm not proud of some of the things I did when I was younger, and honestly, I probably deserved a lot of the whoopings I got... but this isn't me we're talking about here, Squall. This is you. You're different. You have manners. You don't do stupid shit. You don't steal your dad's car or forge your mother's signature. You always watch every little thing you do or say. There's no reason anyone should lay a fucking finger on you."

"I... I'm sorry that happened to you," Squall said hoarsely, his eyes glittering with a kind of scared helplessness as they remained fixated on Seifer's face. "I... I shouldn't have said what I did. I'm a jackass."

"It's alright," Seifer responded with a vague shrug. "The whole thing never really affected me as much as you'd think it would. Maybe it's because I always had some kind of balance in life. My parents and I were never close, you know, but I had an awesome relationship with my grandparents. My father... is a successful man in a lot of ways, but he sucked as a dad. He only tried his hand at parenting when he had some free time to spare, and because of his career that wasn't often. Honestly, I stopped loving him or even caring about him a long time ago. And all in all, my mother was never much better. For all it's worth, I don't even really have parents."

"But... Seifer, you—"

"I'm not like you, Squall," the blond interrupted his friend with a smile that was colored by sadness. "I don't have a mother that would walk to the end of the earth for me. I don't know what that's like. I _do_ know what it's like to have an asshole for a father, though. You're not the type to hate anyone without a good reason, and I don't care what you say – I can tell that you truly, honestly _hate_ that guy your mother married. I don't know what his deal is, exactly, but I know that he's being a dick towards you for no reason. I saw how he treated you at the festival. I'm not an idiot, Squall."

"It's... complicated," the brunette answered evasively, veering his head away as his heart became heavy.

"There's nothing complicated about it. You're a good person. You deserve to be treated that way."

Squall said nothing now, and although Seifer realistically felt no closer to figuring out what was eating his friend, he suddenly realized he'd have to come to terms with the fact that the brunette's demons might be much nearer than he had originally anticipated.

"I know there are a lot of things you aren't telling me," the blond announced in a firm, and yet gentle tone of voice as he finally released Squall's arm and raked his hand through the boy's dark hair instead. "I can't force you to accept my help, but I hope you trust me enough to tell me what's wrong. I know I can be an ass, but I meant what I said. I really do love you. I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere. I'll do whatever I can to make things easier for you... you just have to let me know how."

"... Can we just go to bed, please? I don't wanna talk about this anymore right now."

The brunette had turned his eyes to the ground as he sighed that toneless question, and Seifer knew that he was avoiding him. However, he was also fully aware that Squall had blown through his last reserves of energy hours ago, and he wasn't doing anyone any favors by forcing the younger teen to deal with the skeletons in his closet in his current condition.

Thus, Seifer acknowledged the brunette's request with a nod and gave him a gentle shove towards the door.

"Sure. You gotta be tired as hell," he muttered. "Let's go back inside. I'll show you the bedroom."

And so Seifer followed his exhausted companion into the house, never knowing just how close he had come to burning away the web of lies that had covered Squall's childhood since the very night Kato had first laid his hands on him, scarring his innocent body and soul for many years to come.

* * *

Bright numbers carved through the darkness of the room, stinging his eyes as Seifer rolled over in bed. He was staring at the alarm clock on his night stand at 4:32 in the morning, not knowing why he was awake. They had laid down less than two hours ago, and even though Seifer could pull an all-nighter with the best of them, he had been hit by sleep almost instantly after curling up in bed with his quiet brunette friend and kissing him goodnight.

'_Wait...'_

As the memories of the earlier part of the evening hit his sluggish mind, Seifer bolted upright with a start. His gaze searched the queen sized sleigh bed he'd been resting in with a certain sense of alarm, and with a hiss of frustration, he realized that he was alone.

"**Fuck**."

Immediately, the blond flung his covers aside and jumped off the edge of the bed. His bare feet hit the dark blue rug that covered the wood floor, and a cool draft struck his skin that was covered merely by a pair of black cotton pajama pants. He didn't know why he was panicking over Squall's absence, considering that the brunette might just be getting a late night snack or using the restroom, but experience had taught him better than that.

"You've got to be _kidding_ me. Not again."

Seifer jerked his boots onto his feet and grabbed a random hoodie from the top of his oak dresser, hastily slipping into it while already rushing down the hallway to the staircase. As he bounced down the steps, his first notion was to check if his truck was still parked outside, but part of him knew that Squall would never leave him stranded like that.

"Where the hell are you?" Seifer mumbled to himself with a strained inflection, before raising his voice and shouting, "Hey! Squall! Squall, where are you?"

The response to his calling was, of course, persistent silence. He had expected nothing else, although he would have really loved to have been wrong, _for once_. Cussing, Seifer strode into the kitchen, which was as deserted as they had left it little over an hour ago. Just as the blond was about to whip around and search the rest of the house, a brief flash of light on the kitchen counter snared his undivided attention.

'_... No.'_

He could feel blood pounding through his arteries with enough brute force to rupture his vessels as he stared upon the large boning knife that laid misplaced out in front of him, right by his pack of cigarettes. Feeling an overbearing sense of premonition, Seifer took a few uneven steps to the counter to stare upon the one ordinary item that had completely changed its meaning to him since Squall and his cutting habit had entered his life. When he picked it up, his hands not nearly as steady as they would normally be, he saw that the blade was sharp, but it was clean. As his gaze flew around the room, he noticed that one of the kitchen drawers had been pulled out, and to his terror, the blond knew _exactly_ what Squall had found there.

With a start, Seifer dropped the knife.

"Squall! _Squall_! Where the fuck are you! Squall!"

With a speed and volume that suggested hysteria, Seifer ran through the residence and yelled his friend's name. He found nothing, but when his hectic gaze finally drifted by one of the numerous windows that offered a view of the backyard, all color drained from Seifer's face.

"Oh, no..."

Not wasting even another second of time, Seifer turned on the spot and rushed to the front door, throwing it open. Within the blink of an eye, he was racing through the snow that covered his grandparents' yard. It flurried around his feet as he ran with no regard for his own safety, jumping in leaps down the frozen steps that led to the boat dock.

"Squall! _Squall_!"

He could see his friend sitting at the very edge of the old, short wooden pier, his back turned towards him. Squall was wearing the blue fleece pajama pants that barely fit Seifer but were still too large on the brunette's lean frame, as well as the black jacket he had sported earlier on during the night. His head was bowed, seemingly focused on something in his lap as he sat cross-legged in the snow.

"No!" Seifer screamed. "Squall, NO!"

His boots produced hollow thumping sounds as Seifer crossed the dock in a sprint, never slowing down until he was right by Squall's side. He didn't waste any time to assess the situation – time that Squall could have used to ruin his life for good. The moment the brunette was within his reach, Seifer grabbed his upper right arm and ripped him upwards, pulling him away from the edge of the pier, away from what he believed to be there.

"Squall!"

The brunette stumbled and fell against him with a grunt, obviously unprepared for Seifer's physical ambush. The older boy caught him, but the second Squall had seemingly regained his balance, Seifer took a forceful hold of both of his forearms and spun him around.

What he found clearly _wasn't_ what he had expected.

"What the _fuck_?"

Stunned, Seifer stared upon the shorter boy with the tousled, espresso brown hair, who had just vocally acknowledged his presence for the very first time. Squall was glaring up at him with a look of confused irritation, not understanding why Seifer had just yanked him off the ground, nor why the blond was panting and sweating as if he had just completed a full blown marathon.

As the screaming frenzy inside Seifer's head died down to a whisper, the eighteen year old was both relieved and confused to recognize that Squall was neither clutching a knife nor the trigger of a Magnum 45. Instead, the brunette's hands were empty, and his wrists were as carefully bandaged as they had been since his involuntary ER visit. There was a sour, disapproving grimace showing on his face as he tilted back his head and studied Seifer with obvious skepticism over the older boy's sanity.

"What the hell are you doing, Seifer?"

Groaning as every tight nerve in his body finally snapped loose, Seifer released the brunette's arms and threw his palms against his forehead instead. "Squall... Shit... Oh, my god... I thought... Fuck..."

"You thought _what_?" Squall shot back. "Have you gone completely crackers or what?"

"No! No, I... I saw the knife in the kitchen... and I thought... Shit, I mean, the drawer with my grandpa's gun was open, and I... I thought that you... _Fuck..._"

A sense of understanding crossed Squall's eyes, before that emotion was swapped for something completely different and much less judgmental than the irritable mask that had adorned his face mere seconds ago. Sighing, the brunette inclined his head and said, in a much quieter voice, "... I see."

Wanting nothing more than to touch Squall, as if he needed to reassure himself of the brunette's physical presence, Seifer grabbed the sides of the boy's chilly face and pulled him closer, pressing, "You scared the _shit_ out of me."

For a moment, Squall considered arguing the fact that he hadn't actually _done_ anything to scare Seifer, but he knew that this wasn't entirely true. He shifted slightly in the blond's ironclad hold, balling his own hands to fists as they hung by his sides.

"I... I saw the gun, but I never touched it," the dark haired boy explained in a brittle, unsure voice, before his eyelids suddenly drifted shut. "You're right... I did take the knife. I... didn't do anything with it... but... I thought about it."

"Squall..."

Overwhelmed, Seifer drew the boy into his arms. The brunette was letting out a sigh into his shoulder, surrendering to the love which Seifer had demonstrated to him once more tonight. He could feel the blond shaking as the last remnants of Seifer's anxiety coursed through his body, calmed only by the brunette's skin and breath and heartbeat.

"Idiot..." Squall whispered as he let out a ghostly chuckle bleached of humor. "You worry too much."

"Squall," Seifer immediately rebutted, withdrawing his head slightly so he could meet the younger boy's eyes. "Why are you out here in the cold? Why were you thinking about cutting yourself? Why didn't you wake me up and talk to me? What's going on with you?"

"I... I don't know. I couldn't sleep. My head was... so full... of shit. It seems like I can never make it stop, unless..." the brunette explained with a helpless inflection, before he paused. "Anyway. I didn't mean to worry you. I'm sorry."

"You've been through so much lately," Seifer acknowledged, not even fully aware of the gruesome extent of Squall's trauma. "After what happened today... I would have almost understood if you'd have gone through with it. But... only almost. I don't want you to hurt yourself, even if you think it's the only way you'll feel better."

"I know," the younger teen murmured, and Seifer could tell that he meant it. It was a rare occasion to see the brunette so honest and vulnerable, and the knowledge that Squall trusted him enough to let down his guard, even just briefly, made Seifer's heart ache.

"There's always a better way, Squall," the blond reminded him, hoping that his sincere words would finally break through to his hardheaded, wounded friend. To his surprise, Squall continued to look neither offended nor angry; the brunette seemed contemplative as he stood there in the freezing night air, his dark eyes reflecting the moonlight.

"I've thought about... finding my grandparents. I've thought about it many times," Squall deadpanned, unexpectedly bringing up the conversation he had so brutally cut short earlier during the night. "But... I realized there's no point. They were never there for my mother or me. Laguna was never there, either, but... at least he didn't know I existed. They did."

As Seifer watched the boy he adored so much, he realized that Squall was as tough and unbending as he was fragile. Somehow, through all the other sorrow and misery, he was attempting to deal with issues he had left untouched for years, until Seifer had blazingly decided to drag them to the surface. He could tell that Squall's pain was searing to the bone and could not be measured in blood or bandages, but the bravado in his eyes never yielded, even now.

"We all have our skeletons, and our own ways to deal," Seifer reassured him in a calm, but strong voice. "Your life is complicated right now, and it's not my place to tell you how to handle it. I'm sorry, I was out of line."

Producing a hollow chuckle, Squall said, "My life was never _not_ complicated. Maybe you're right and I should just find them and get it over with."

"No," the blond denied, shaking his head as he rubbed his right hand up and down the length of Squall's spine comfortingly. "Give it time. You're not ready right now. You can always find your grandparents later, if you really want to. And if you don't, it's okay too... because honestly, they never deserved you in the first place."

Squall regarded him with a long, thoughtful look but said nothing this time. As Seifer continued to watch him affectionately and eventually drew him close once more, he could feel anger rising in the pit of his stomach over all the hurt and terror that Squall had been forced to endure. He'd never met anyone who was more deserving of a quiet, happy life than the selfless brunette who was standing motionlessly in his arms, and Seifer was determined to bring peace to Squall's mind and body – no matter what it took or how long he would have to work to make it happen.

'_I wish I could just take you away from all this. It's not fair. No matter where you go, it seems like your problems just follow you. Why aren't you ever allowed to just take a breather?'_

The moment Seifer's frustration seized control over his thought process, something in the back of his mind suddenly clicked into place.

'_... Fuck. Of course! Why didn't I think of this earlier?'_

"Hey, Squall," Seifer said, nudging the boy's temple with his chin, "Do you know anyone in Dollet?"

"Dollet?" the brunette responded unsurely, his voice coated before he cleared his throat. He almost sounded as if he'd been crying. "No. I've never even been there."

"Perfect."

Squall drew his brows together at the pleased undertone to Seifer's statement and pulled away a few inches.

"Why?" he asked skeptically.

"Because I'm taking you there tomorrow," Seifer announced simply. "It's not far from here, and my grandparents own a beach house there. It's almost the weekend, so we can stay for a few days, if you want. Besides, I'm pretty sure it hasn't snowed there yet, and we both know you're not a fan."

"... Shouldn't you spend some time with your grandmother?" the brunette retorted critically. "That's why we drove out here, after all."

"Yeah, we drove out here so I could check on her, but she's fine," the older boy answered, the nuance in his words changing from impassive to serious. "... You, however, are not."

Squall didn't contend the blond's claim this time, realizing that it was pointless. He had been sitting outside in the snow in his pajamas in the middle of the night, after riffling through the drawers in the kitchen for a suitable tool to slice up his wrists for what felt like the hundredth time – 'fine' was probably not the most suitable term to describe his current state of mind.

"We already missed a day and a half of school this week," the brunette finally stated pragmatically. "Maybe we should just go back, if you don't care about staying."

"I think Deling City High and your grades will be fine without you for a few days. This is more important than school, Squall. You need a break, some time away from that place. Especially after what happened today."

There was truth to the blond's statement, and even the brunette had to acknowledge it. Not wanting to stir up the painful memories of Jeff's attack, which were still too fresh in his memory, Squall simply veered his head aside with a look of defeat and murmured, "Whatever."

With a satisfied grin, Seifer nuzzled his companion's tousled hair and let the palms of his large hands venture further down Squall's back, until they suddenly, and very unceremoniously, cupped the brunette's butt.

"Holy shit, your ass is freezing wet, Squall!" Seifer barked in a tone of surprise, while grabbing the boy's pajama clad cheeks and giving them a few good squeezes. He really thought that Squall had a fine little backside, all tight and muscled and what not, and to be perfectly honest, he'd never pass by an opportunity to appreciate and worship it as thoroughly as he could.

Of course, the guy who owned said fine backside now coldly dug his heel into the top of Seifer's foot, sneering, "I was sitting in the snow, dumbass. Quit fondling me."

"Maybe I should check for frost boils," the blond mused with a playful lilt, although he couldn't help but wince when Squall ground his foot more assertively into his own in return. "Hey, ouch!"

"Maybe you should just shut up and do what I tell you," Squall suggested sarcastically.

"If I did what you tell me to do, I'd still be busy fucking myself right now," the blond laughed, and before Squall had a chance to react to his teasing, he suddenly grabbed the brunette around the waist, lifted him up and threw him across his shoulder.

"_Whoa_!" the brunette yelped as his eyes abruptly became level with an upside down close-up view of Seifer's ass cheeks. "What the shit, crackhead? Put me down!"

"What'd ya say? Sorry, can't hear you back there," Seifer chortled. He was holding onto Squall with his right arm, while giving the boy's rear end another fond pat with his left hand. "Well, time to take you inside, princess. Your pretty little ass needs some warming up."

"Your _face_ needs some shutting up!" the brunette bellowed. "Put me down, you depraved idiot!"

Laughing heartily, Seifer ignored the boy's noisy protests and instead slowly started trotting towards the house. As he made his way through the darkness and the nearly undisturbed blanket of snow stretched out before him, his cussing boyfriend securely fastened to his shoulder, neither of them realized that Squall had healed a little on that cold Balamb night. He had turned down the familiar blade of a kitchen knife and the deadly barrel of a gun, not because he didn't need them, but because he needed other things more. All this time, Squall had believed that he had been enduring Kato's abuse for the sake of his family's safety and freedom, but perhaps he had never fully understood those terms until today. He had finally experienced what it felt like to deny an urge that had, at times, been even more powerful than his instinct to survive. For years, his cuts and scars had been nothing but another victory of Kato's, and Squall was tired of seeing the man win. Every day, Seifer's place in the brunette boy's heart grew bigger, and his stepfather's grip on his life weaker. Through the banter, the fighting, the laughing and the heartache, Squall had gradually come to love the annoying blond by his side, and Seifer's constant presence had somehow made everything easier to deal with.

In the end, the skeletons in Squall's closet had far from disappeared, but for the first time, he had turned away from the only coping mechanism he had ever learned, never knowing that the price he had paid all these years had always been much too high to bear.

-:-

This one was the first one, this one had a vice

This one here I like to rub on dark and stormy nights

This one was the last one, I don't remember how

But I remember blood and rain

And I never saw it coming again.

"_Made of Scars" – Stone Sour_

-:-

* * *

Happy Holidays, guys :) Have a short little Whispered Screams Chapter.

Much Love,

AA.


	37. Across the Stars

-:-

**Chapter 37  
****Across the Stars**

"_It's so noisy... all the time."_

-:-

I close my eyes to no avail

Three days of aching sleepless

I wish these sheets would suffocate me while I wait

I love the cuts that make the lines

Arranged in beautiful designs

I fight with the sharp side of a razor blade

It's not right I can't escape the choice I made.

_"The Enemy Inside" – Egypt Central_

-:-

Seifer Almasy had always believed that it was better to ask for forgiveness than for permission. Throughout the past decade, he had lived his life in that manner – often lying, cheating or exercising his disproportionate strength on others for pastime's sake, burning many bridges along the way and really never asking for forgiveness at all. He would simply prepare for the consequences of getting caught red-handed and face them with a smile, believing that his parents' righteous anger – in all its violent, pretentious, satisfying glory – made any punishment worthwhile.

Needless to say, things had inevitably come to change since Seifer had made the acquaintance of one fascinatingly selfless, loyal, well-mannered Squall Leonhart. Whether the obstinate blond had changed his ways by his own free will or not remained debatable, but the transformation of the only son of the Almasy family had become obvious to anyone who knew him reasonably well. Seifer's rebellious nature, of course, remained practically untouched, but he had learned to be more considerate and respectful towards others, displaying a moral fortitude that - on the surface - seemed quite unlike him.

His grandmother, nevertheless, hadn't seemed too terribly surprised when Seifer had called her and asked her permission to stay at the beach house in Dollet with his boyfriend. She had wanted to spend some more quality time with her grandson and his attention-grabbing love interest, of course, but she knew fully well that the blond was flighty and easily distracted. On top of all this, Seifer had hinted to her that his companion, Squall, needed a break from his usual, stressful environment. Considering the brunette boy's traumatized appearance at her bedside only hours before, Belle completely understood her grandson's motivations and found them to be rather honorable, in fact. Therefore, she had shown no qualms over allowing the two teenagers to stay at the cottage for a few days' worth of a getaway.

Seifer's mother, however, hadn't been quite so accommodating.

The first time she had called him on the phone, Seifer had answered, but his patience with his mother had run thin after about two solid minutes of being screamed at. Truthfully, he hadn't felt bad at all when he hung up on her, nor when he ignored the twelve phone calls that followed and went straight to voicemail. Ideally, he would have liked to have kept Squall oblivious to his constant, pathetic family drama, but the brunette sat with him through it all, watching him with disapproving eyes and not saying a word as they were steadily making their way to Dollet.

Of course, Seifer had also never been one to sit in silence for very long.

"So... you've really never been to Dollet before?" Seifer eventually asked his dark haired classmate casually as they were driving down the small beachside road that led to his grandparents' cottage. The sky was a brilliant, crystal clear shade of blue as it stretched above them, and there wasn't a single snowflake in sight, although temperatures outside had definitely reached the low point of the season. Squall was studying the picturesque scenery from the passenger seat of the blond's truck, and he jerked his left shoulder in a shrug in response to Seifer's question.

"No."

"Why not?" the blond inquired curiously. "This is a pretty famous tourist dump, after all, and it sounds like you've traveled quite a bit. Do your parents not like Dollet, or what's goin' on here?"

"... My stepfather has a beach house in Fisherman's Horizon, and another one in Esthar. He always took us there for the summer, or to Trabia for winter vacation. I guess there was never a reason to come here," Squall explained in a quiet monotone without meeting his friend's eyes. He had rolled his window down and his freshly washed hair was moving softly in the breeze. Although Squall looked remarkably better than he had the previous day, considering he'd taken a shower and his clothes had been laundered, he also seemed unusually distracted and preoccupied. Honestly, Seifer wasn't quite sure what to make of it.

"You know, you never talk about your stepfather like he's actually part of your family," Seifer pointed out as he was tapping the steering wheel with his thumbs in an off-beat rhythm to the song that was playing somewhere in the background on the radio. "It always kinda sounds like he's just some dude you guys live with."

Squall snapped his head around to him momentarily, the sole purpose of his willful eye contact to pierce Seifer with a look of loathing, before he abruptly faced the passenger window once more.

"... I told you I don't wanna talk about this," Squall bit with an irritable snarl.

"I was just making an observation," the blond responded calmly, the pitch of his voice free of confrontation. "That's all."

Squall wanted to tell Seifer to make his uncalled-for observations elsewhere, but decided against it. The morning had already been filled with nothing but arguments, although most of them had taken place between Seifer and his upset parent. Deep down, Squall couldn't help but feel at least partially responsible for Seifer's volatile disagreement with his mother, as well as the fact that they had left Balamb before Belle's return to her residence. Honestly, Squall had enjoyed the company of the sweet, elderly woman – as much as he was _able_ to enjoy the company of a complete stranger, anyway. Somehow, nothing seemed to have gone according to plan since they had arrived in Balamb – not that Squall had ever had a plan to begin with. There was a nagging feeling in the back of his mind that he was doing something wrong, like an itch that he couldn't reach, and it was gradually driving him up the wall.

Seifer, of course, was at least partly aware of his friend's chaotic mental state, and he was determined to figure out the reason for Squall's persistent moodiness this morning.

"Hey. What are you thinking about?"

The brunette merely rolled his eyes this time, instead of honoring Seifer with a proper look. Snorting, he clipped with obvious attitude, "Did you seriously just ask me that?"

"Why, is that some kind of problem, your lordship?" Seifer retorted in a tone he would adapt when trying to get a rise out of his companion, while quizzically raising one brow.

"Funny you'd ask," Squall snapped, now crossing his arms in front of his chest and pressing his lips to a harsh line as he gave Seifer a sideways glare. "Yeah, in fact, it _is _a fucking problem."

"And why's that, cupcake?"

"Fuck, shut up and quit calling me stupid names already!" Squall shot back acidly as he slammed his right fist against his passenger door with a deafening thud. "You're going on my last fucking nerve! I'm about sick of listening to you, alright!"

Heaving a loud sigh, Seifer shook his head. He was no stranger to Squall's bouts of bitchiness and the fact that the boy apparently had a permanently-lit fuse, but at the moment, he was really in no mood to deal with the brunette's abrasive attitude. Of course, he understood that Squall was on edge; the boy was in a strange environment, he was worried about his family and school, and he'd just taken a major beating by three of his senior classmates. Nevertheless, he wasn't going to allow the younger male to bathe in his own self-loathing and let his impulsive anger out on everyone around him who didn't deserve it.

'_I'm not the one that tried to gangbang you. I came to help you, remember? Don't let this fuck fest in your head out on me.'_

Instead of saying what was really on his mind, however, Seifer took a deep, calming breath and suggested off-handedly, "Hey, Squall. Let's go downtown before we go to the cottage. I wanna pick up some food and drinks. There's also some museums and stuff there, in case you're into that sorta thing."

Looking skeptical over the blond's sudden loss in interest over his innermost thoughts, and the fact that he had addressed him by his proper first name, Squall replied, "What? Museums? Here?"

"Yeah," the blond nodded, relieved that Squall had lowered his voice to a more civil level. "Dollet isn't just a popular tourist attraction, ya know, it's also famous for being the first town that offered TV broadcasting many years ago. It was a pretty big deal back then. My grandpa took me to one of the museums where they tell you all about it. It's pretty cool, actually. I had a lot of fun when I went. Do you wanna go?"

For the first time in about an hour, Squall faced Seifer without looking as if he wanted to run the blond through with a meat cleaver. His quick temper had already cooled once more, and his expression looked much less sour than it had. Seifer actually noticed a spark of curiosity in the brunette's guarded blue eyes that he liked, and he grinned at the younger boy encouragingly in return.

"Alright," the dark haired teen eventually agreed, after a seemingly obligatory period of hesitation. "Why not."

"Sweet," Seifer whistled appreciatively. "Let's do it!"

And thus, Seifer and Squall spent the greater part of the day in the central district of Dollet, checking out museums, various tourist shops, a famous hotel and the busy boardwalk by the ocean. Fortunately, Squall's bad mood improved quite noticeably, and Seifer was pleased to see the brunette actually enjoying himself for once. They grabbed a few slices of pizza for lunch at a local pub and even had some ice cream for dessert, but by the end of the day, Seifer made it a point to stop by the local grocery store to pick up a few items for a relaxed dinner at home. After some bickering back and forth, they settled on spaghetti with a cream-based tomato sauce (from the jar, of course, since neither of them was a particularly skilled cook), and Seifer also didn't miss the opportunity to grab a couple bottles of relatively expensive Bordeaux wine. By the time they were finally pulling into the driveway of the cottage, it was well past six o'clock and getting dark out.

"Well, here we are, princess. Home sweet home away from home," Seifer announced happily as they both climbed out of the truck, feeling ravenous and tired from walking circles all over Dollet. The blond grabbed their grocery bags, as well as the rucksack with spare clothing and laundry detergent he had brought from home. Of course, Squall had no clothes with him aside from the ones he was wearing on his body, but Seifer had selected a few suitable items for him out of his own closet, since the brunette had refused to allow him to take him shopping. Currently, Squall was wearing one of his thin, dark grey colored hoodies – the smallest one Seifer had been able to find. Naturally, it still looked slightly too big on the smaller-framed brunette, but at least it was worlds better than the scrub top he'd been prancing around in.

Squall, meanwhile, remained motionless in the driveway, staring in awe upon the pale, sandy coast that stretched for miles right behind the idyllic oceanfront home. He could hear the sound of the waves crashing into the dunes, and there wasn't a single human being in sight aside from the two of them. Flocks of seagulls were floating on the currents of the wind, providing a constant source of background noise.

"Do you like it?" Seifer asked as he stopped next to his classmate, his inflection more tender than it usually would be.

The brunette nodded, but seemed too taken aback to say much else in response. They approached the cottage that was constructed out of flagstone, wood and mortar; it wasn't huge as far as houses were concerned, but Squall immediately felt a sense of peace and stillness wash over him the moment he set foot through the front door, followed closely by his friend.

Once inside, Squall tilted his head back to stare at the ceiling as he walked around, gazing upon beautiful, rustic looking wooden beams and artfully crafted stone work. There was a fireplace in the small living-room, a country style kitchen made out of white wood and rum-colored granite, and a back porch that led straight out onto the beach. He could hear numerous wind chimes swaying in the brisk ocean breeze outside, and with an awestruck expression, he noticed the last dying rays of the sun breaking through the polished glass windows, burning up the sky as it turned from red to black.

'_This is... beautiful.'_

Through all the years and all the different places Squall had lived in and visited, he had never felt as much at home as he did in that tiny, breathtaking cottage by the sea, which didn't even belong to him or his family. Of course, that sweet, somewhat confusing feeling of tranquility he experienced also came with a touch of bitterness, just as any other happy moment he'd ever had the pleasure to enjoy; Squall remembered his parents' wedding at the beach house in Esthar only too well, and yet the image seemed distant now as he stood there bathed in light, almost as if his mind was trying to replace the painful memories with ones that were much more pleasant in nature.

'_Maybe that's what I need to do. I need to find... better things to fill my head with. Things that... have nothing to do with Kato.'_

"I'd say we watch the sunset, but it looks like we came a little late for that. We can head out there later though and have a bonfire. That's what I bought the marshmallows for," Seifer announced randomly as he strode into the kitchen and spread their groceries on the counter of a small cooking island. He noticed that Squall remained rooted to his position in the middle of the room, gazing out into the quickly approaching darkness with a vacant expression, like his thoughts were in a completely different place.

"Hey," the blond asked, speaking more loudly this time in order to attract Squall's attention. "You alright, cupcake?"

Visibly snapping out of it, Squall jerked on the spot and turned around, his eyes wider than normal as they met Seifer' expectant face.

"What?" he said in a dazed tone of voice, before the older teen's question finally seemed to sink in. "Oh. Yeah. I'm fine."

Clearing his throat, Squall walked up to the kitchen island and rested his elbows upon the counter, examining their dinner supplies.

"You ready for some food?" Seifer asked with an inquisitive smile.

"Yeah," the brunette nodded, prodding the package of pasta they had bought with his index finger. "I'm starving."

"Well, you wanna throw the salad and the dressing in a bowl while I start cooking the pasta and the sauce?"

"Sure," Squall agreed, and suddenly, Seifer noticed a playful twitch by the corner of his lips. "Just don't fuck up our food, or I'll kill you."

"Wouldn't dream of it, your evil lordshipness," the blond laughed, before he suddenly slapped his right hand down on the counter. "Oh, hey! Almost forgot."

Looking curious, Squall watched him retrieving two juice glasses and plates from a nearby hutch, before proceeding to uncork one of the wine bottles he had bought at the store. With an unsure and critical expression, the brunette gazed upon Seifer as he was pouring wine into both of the glasses, consequently sliding one across the counter towards him.

"There you go," Seifer said blithely, already taking the first sip of his own drink. "Bottoms up."

"I can't drink that," Squall instantly replied with a scowl, his eyes fixated upon the swirling, dark red liquid.

"Why not?"

The blond's dumbfounded expression annoyed Squall; honestly, could Seifer be _that_ fucking dim?

"Because I'm underage, idiot," he shot back pragmatically, crossing his arms in front of his chest as he assumed his typical, defensive posture.

"Oh, don't I know it, you little piece of jailbait, you," the blond snorted teasingly, obviously highly amused over his friend's serious response. "Come on, you're 17. You're not a kid anymore. Live a little. It's not gonna kill ya, I promise."

Of course, the dark haired teen continued to look hesitant, and finally, his head streaked aside and he admitted in a flat tone of voice that was colored by a hint of embarrassment, "I've never had alcohol before."

"Really? Well..." Seifer lilted huskily as he licked a drop of wine off his lips and gave Squall a long, sideways look, "First time for everything, sweetheart. Alcohol included."

Growling, Squall snapped, "Don't fuck with me, asshole."

"Squall," the eighteen year old addressed his friend calmly now, all mockery suddenly bleached from his voice as he lowered his glass and looked the dark haired teen straight in the eye, ignoring the helplessness he found there. "It's just you and me here. Nothing bad is going to happen just because you have a couple glasses of wine. We're not out at some dive bar. You're safe here, and I won't tell anyone, if that's what you're worried about. You can trust me. I promise."

The brunette was chewing on his bottom lip, clearly looking conflicted over the blond's proposition, but just as Seifer was about to tell him to forget about it, Squall finally grunted, "Fine. Whatever."

With the look of someone who was about to attend his own funeral, Squall grabbed the glass of Bordeaux off the table and took a few hasty sips, almost as if he was afraid he was going to change his mind. Seifer couldn't help but chuckle when the brunette's expression soured the moment the wine hit his palate, and he had to admit that it was a rather adorable sight to see Squall fighting to keep a straight face.

"Soo," Seifer sang, obviously biting back a laugh. "How is it?"

Squall let out a few aborted coughs, before choking out a breathless "awesome" as he quickly forced down another few gulps.

"Right," the blond snickered. "Whatever you say, cupcake."

"F-fuck you."

"You know... you really shouldn't drink it that fast," Seifer advised with a grin when he ruffled Squall's hair affectionately as he passed him on his way to the fridge. "It's alcohol. It'll get to ya before you know it."

"Th-thanks, Captain Obvious, " the younger boy coughed with a wry grimace, naturally not wanting to be treated like a child. He would have never admitted it, but Seifer's teasing about his age and inexperience had bothered him. Obviously, he knew that most kids at his school had been sneaking drinks for years, and Seifer himself seemed quite skilled at holding his liquor, but drinking wasn't something the brunette had ever been interested in. On top of that, he was very aware of the fact that most people weren't in full control of what they were saying and doing once they were drunk – not that he was ever planning on going that far. Still, the consumption of alcohol struck him as an inevitable part of the process of growing up, and if anything was going to hold him back from being considered an adult, it most certainly wasn't going to be a stupid bottle of wine.

So they drank and cooked and bantered, and by the time dinner was sitting half-eaten in front of them on the table, Squall had polished off almost three tall glasses of wine – and by all things holy, it was showing. Seifer noticed with great interest that the brunette was being entirely more animated and a whole lot louder than he normally would be. Although getting Squall wasted had never been part of the plan, he figured that the brunette had only himself to blame for chugging wine like it was goddamn tap water.

'_What the hell is he thinking? He's never had a drop of alcohol before. He should know better. Considering what a little control freak he normally is, this is a bit of a shocker.'_

They sat across from each other, with Squall nursing his third glass of wine, rambling about UFOs and why monkeys were supposedly smarter than astronauts. Honestly, Seifer had no idea how Squall had ventured into that peculiar topic of conversation, nor did he really care. The blond was simply perched on his chair, his chin resting in the palm of his hand as he picked at his food and watched Squall throwing his hands around with a cute flush blossoming on his cheeks. For some reason, the untypical redness of Squall's skin made the indigo stain of the bruise below his left eye seem more pronounced, and despite his generally wonderful mood, Seifer couldn't help but scowl at the sight.

"Squall," the concerned blond interrupted his talkative, buzzing friend, "How's your face feeling?"

"My face?" Squall bellowed, throwing his fist down on the table hard enough to cause their plates to bounce on the wooden surface and Seifer to cock a surprised brow. "My face is fantastic!"

Snorting, the blond retorted in an obviously flirtations manner, "You're damn right it is."

"Your face is pretty fucking fantastic, too!" Squall declared loudly, seated a bit lopsided in his chair now as he leaned across the table and pointed his fork demonstratively at Seifer's head.

"Oh, yeah? You saying I'm hot or somethin'?" the blond asked with a self-satisfied smirk, fully aware that he was taking advantage of Squall's intoxicated state, and yet not feeling too entirely guilty about it. After all, if anything, he figured that the alcohol had probably just loosened the boy's tongue a little. Nevertheless, at this very point in time, he still wasn't one hundred percent sure whether he should really reap the full benefits of that situation.

"Hot? Of course you're hot. Everyone thinks you're hot. My fork thinks you're hot. Fucking shit. Fuck. You're really hot."

Seifer couldn't help but laugh heartily at the boy's ridiculous compliment. Tilting his head, he replied with an appreciative purr, "Well, thanks and all, but look who's talking here. You're all _kinds_ of fucking hot, Squall."

"Hot? _Me_? Hah. I'm not hot. Your _face_ is hot," the brunette giggled cheerfully, and Seifer could suddenly feel his heart flipping back and forth in his chest when he studied his exquisite looking companion from across the table. The dark haired teen was sitting there with his head inclined slightly, eyes shining with tears of laughter, hair falling in chunks into his face, lips stained blood red from his drink. There wasn't a thing about him that didn't _scream_ hotness.

'_Jesus Christ.'_

Closing his eyes, Seifer let out a long breath and attempted to dig up whatever reason he had left within him. He knew that this wasn't the time to be getting a hard-on and consider throwing his friend against the nearest wall and start ripping off his clothes, but then again, it also sounded like the best idea that had crossed his mind in a good long while.

"You know," his companion's lilting voice suddenly cut into his calculated efforts of keeping his libido in check, "I don't know what the fuck you see in me. I really don't. You're... you're hot, and cool, and you have muscles, and I'm not like you at all, and I'm really, _really_ fucked up. Holy shit. I'm so fucking _fucked up_. ... Fuck. I'm drunk."

Then, Seifer heard a loud thud, and he instinctively jumped to his feet while his eyelids flung open. Somehow, Squall had managed to fall sideways off his chair and landed face-first on the floor. However, before Seifer even had a chance to dart around the table and help Squall up, the brunette was already back in a standing position, holding on to the table with one hand and pointing one finger at the blond very authoritatively.

"You didn't see that."

Turning his gaze towards the ceiling in silent plea, Seifer simply groaned, "Sure. I didn't see anything, Squall. Not a thing. Now, how about you go have a seat on the couch or something?"

"Fantastic idea!"

Once more, Seifer was astounded by the younger teen's drunk enthusiasm as he went straight for the couch and plopped down into the cushions, his fork still clutched firmly in his right hand. As he watched Squall flailing the cutlery through the air as if he was brandishing some kind of weapon, the boy's words from only seconds before suddenly cut back into his awareness.

"Hey, Squall," Seifer started as he, too, made his way to the couch and stopped beside it, leaning over the back to eye his friend, who had laid down now and was hanging halfway off the furniture. "What do you mean, you're really fucked up?"

"In here," Squall declared without deliberation, eagerly poking his left forefinger into his own temple. "Things aren't _right_ up in there."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I am _fucked_ in the _head_ is what I mean by that!" Squall shouted brazenly, before his face changed and he announced in a slurred, breathless voice, "You're really hot, you know."

"Squall, why do you think you're fucked in the head?" Seifer asked seriously, ignoring the brunette's drunken antics.

"Ha!" the dark haired boy snorted as he suddenly bolted upright into a seating position and flung the fork he had been clutching halfway across the room. "There isn't enough booze in this house to make me tell you that!"

Raising his eyebrows, Seifer watched how Squall jumped to his feet once more and made a beeline for his wine glass, which he had left sitting on the dining table. He was still surprisingly steady on his feet, or perhaps he was just _that_ determined to pounce on the Bordeaux and get a bit more sloshed. Either way, Seifer realized that it was time to put a lid on Squall's newly discovered liking for booze, before he would turn from a silly, animated drunk into an angry one.

'_Knowing him, it's kind of a surprise he's been in this much of a good mood. I kinda figured he'd start bawling or throwing things or something... something more destructive than his fork, anyway. I mean, fuck, you never know with him.'_

Not looking one bit pissed off at all, in fact, Squall was leaning onto the table now, his weight supported on one leg as he stood there, raising his half-empty glass to his lips once more. Before he had a chance to give his steadily rising blood alcohol level another boost, however, Seifer had stepped up to him and gently took the glass from the brunette's unsuspecting hand.

"I think you've had enough," the blond informed him evenly, his face radiating kindness as he gave Squall a long, intense long. Then, he turned away and proceeded to carry both of their glasses to the sink and dumped their contents down the drain. To his amusement, Squall only honored him with a disappointed grunt before he ambled back to the couch and belly flopped into the cushions, burying his face in one of the pillows.

"You alright there, killer?" Seifer inquired in a smooth, lighthearted tone of voice after he had followed Squall to the sofa once more and squatted down next to him on the floor, studying the brunette with a grin. Squall's shirt was riding halfway up his back and his feet were dangling off the end of the couch as he was groaning into his pillow.

"... Hey. You have a really nice ass, you know that?" the blond suddenly mused pensively as he roved the shallow dip of Squall's lower back and the tantalizing curve of his butt with an appreciative gaze. The brunette accredited his compliment with a series of muffled noises, before he finally shifted around in his position and turned his face slightly towards his classmate.

"No. My ass is dirty," he mumbled, a hiss of air escaping from his slightly parted lips as he rested his head in the crook of his own elbow. His hair was disheveled and stuck to his flushed skin now, and his eyes looked glassier than they had, harboring a disoriented sort of shadow. He looked vulnerable as he laid there, reciprocating his older friend's probing look.

"Not any dirtier than mine or anyone else's," Seifer acknowledged with a subtle shrug, before he reached out and carefully brushed a few tendrils of hair out of Squall's face. The boy smelled of wine and tomato sauce, and he seemed more self-aware and emotional than he had in a while. Seifer enjoyed seeing that honest, unguarded side of Squall, and yet, he felt regret over the fact that the brunette was only exposing himself like this because he'd been drinking.

"Yes, it is," Squall insisted.

Puzzled by that statement, Seifer froze in his movement and asked, "Why would you think that?"

Squall continued to stare at him from his awkward position for several moments, seemingly questioning whether he should reward Seifer with an answer or not. Finally, he rolled his eyes and murmured in a coarse, semi-growling tone, "... So, what happens now? You take advantage of me or something?"

Of course, the blond hadn't expected that kind of retort, so he blinked at the brunette in surprise, before quickly catching himself. As a small, humored smile lit up his face, he said patiently, "No. I'm taking your drunk ass to bed."

"I'm not drunk."

"Sure you're not," the blond agreed, pouring on the sarcasm, knowing full well that Squall was too inebriated to pick up on it. "Alright, princess. Let's get you up."

"But I'm not tired," Squall attempted to argue childishly while Seifer had already grabbed his forearm and pulled him to his feet. They paused for a moment, standing less than a breath apart from each other, and Seifer could feel the heat that was emanating from Squall's body. Almost gingerly, he placed one hand on the brunette's left hip, feeling it swaying slightly beneath his touch. The brunette looked almost ethereal as he stood there, scars and bruises and all, and by god, he was the most beautiful thing the blond had ever seen.

"I really hope you remember this when you wake up in the morning," Seifer whispered as he gently pressed a kiss to Squall's damp forehead, "Because I'll be damned if I'm holding back for no reason here."

Squall was staring up at him with an adorable air of confusion, obviously not understanding, and he rubbed the tip of his nose with his index finger as he screwed up his face. He had removed his bandages before his shower this morning and never bothered to replace them, because he obviously didn't care enough to put forth the effort. Seifer was tracing the scabbing cuts and ink blue shadows that marred the boy's porcelain skin with a glint in his eyes, before he sighed.

"Come on, you lush," the eighteen year old teased lovingly as he gave Squall a gentle shove towards the bedroom. "This way."

He steered the somewhat struggling brunette through the living-room and the kitchen to one of the two bedrooms, which contained a beautiful queen sized bed constructed from a type of lumber that vaguely resembled drift wood. His grandmother had covered it in a neat heap of starch white sheets, fluffed up pillows and thick blankets that were incredibly soft to the touch. Squall let out a tiny sound of delight as he fell backwards into the mattress, stretching his arms and legs like some lazy feline. Snorting, Seifer proceeded to take off the brunette's boots, which he threw on the floor with a thud. Squall was simply lying in the covers, gazing up at him out of half-lidded eyes while Seifer motioned towards his chest.

"Take off your sweater and your pants. You'll get hot," the blond ordered, before he spent the next five minutes or so watching the brunette trying to struggle free from the tricky confinement of his clothes. Just as Seifer was about to fix himself a bowl of popcorn and continue to enjoy the show, Squall had finally succeeded in peeling off his pants and pulling his shirt over his own head. His right arm was still caught in the sleeve of his hoodie, but the dark haired boy didn't seem to care. With a content groan, he drug one of the blankets across his own, half-naked body and nestled his head in one of the pillows.

"Hopeless, I swear," Seifer sighed as he yanked the shirt off Squall's arm and tossed it across the foot of the bed, along with his khakis. Then, he returned to the kitchen to check all the door locks and turn off the lights. He chose to leave the fireplace in the living room lit, knowing that the dancing amber flames surrounding a carefully stacked pile of wood would die down on their own before long.

'_It would have been nice to stay up and enjoy the fire a while longer, but I guess this was my fault. I talked him into drinking, after all. Shit, he was fucking hot tonight, though. He's cute as hell when he's buzzed. Man, I wanted to fuck him so bad there for a minute that it's making my damn nuts hurt. Fuck. Ahh, well, whatever. Not like I can really do anything about it. He'd never trust me again if I tried something while he's all wined up. I guess I better hit the hay before I end up getting blue balls here. If nothing else, I guess I can always rub one out.'_

Shaking his head, the tall blond finally paced back into the bedroom, only to find his companion completely knocked the fuck out, snoring up a storm as his tangled limbs were splayed across the covers. As he stopped and leaned against the doorway, Seifer scratched his head in astonishment, only to flinch visibly when Squall suddenly let out a particularly deafening snort.

'_... You have got to be kidding me.'_

Seifer couldn't help but be genuinely amused by the sleeping brunette, who had stubbornly claimed that he wasn't tired less than five minutes ago. Chortling, Seifer rid himself of his own clothes, save for his boxer shorts, and climbed into bed with his adorably obnoxious love interest. It took him a few moments to arrange Squall to his liking, since the brunette was pretty much a dead weight in his comatose state. As Seifer watched the dark haired boy's face after it had come to rest on the left side of his chest, he felt a well of powerful, shapeless emotions bubbling up inside him. He'd always been aware of his fondness for the ill-tempered brunette, but to see him so peaceful that he was literally drooling on Seifer's sharply muscled pecs made the blond's heart burn with affection.

'_Man... you really are something else, you know that? Hopefully, you'll at least manage to sleep through the night this time. I mean, with all that wine and all those carbs you have on board, how couldn't you? God knows you could use a good night's rest.'_

As he drew Squall more tightly against him, the brunette made a few low, indistinguishable noises in return, before falling silent once more. Seifer continued to stay up, listening to the dark haired teen's breathing and running his hand through Squall's silky, mussed up hair, until he, too, finally surrendered to sleep, not yet knowing that once the sun would rise again in the morning, their lives would no longer be the same.

* * *

"_NO_!"

He woke up screaming, gasping for air, covered in sweat as his lips formed a breathless cry. His heart was racing into his throat, leaving him scared and winded. There was a suffocating feeling of not knowing where he was that closed in around him, and he hugged himself tightly as his face twisted with agony. He'd had the same dream – the same nightmare – that had been torturing him every time he'd dared to close his eyes since Jeff's brutal attack on him. He felt like he was being choked by an invisible pair of hands, and he shuddered as he wrenched his fingers into his own hair. His head was throbbing with the worst headache he had experienced in years, and he didn't understand what was going on – at least not until he allowed his panicked gaze to flit around the room and he ultimately found a soundly sleeping Seifer closely by his right side, moving against him ever so subtly.

'_What the...'_

Stunned, Squall realized that he was sitting bolt upright in a bed with Seifer... a bed that was located in a room he had never seen before in his life. Only when his eyes searched the walls around him and found a glass porch door that granted him a view of the dark ocean outside did he come to understand that he had been fast asleep in Belle Almasy's Dollet beach house.

'_Shit... of course...'_

After racking his memory for a few seconds, he finally remembered that he had been eating pasta and drinking wine with Seifer that evening, until the blond had eventually hauled him off to bed. The reminiscence of their dinner together was a bit fuzzy, to be honest, but as he continued to strain his memory, Squall was actually able to recall most of it. He had been in a ridiculously good mood that night, blurting out whatever had come to his inebriated mind, his mental filter clearly out of commission due to the alcohol that his body wasn't accustomed to.

'_Fuck. What the hell was I thinking? I don't think I said anything too stupid, but that was a dumb and dangerous thing to do. I should have never drank that much. Shit. Fuck, my head hurts. Son of a bitch.'_

Groaning, Squall leaned against the headboard of the bed and massaged the bridge of his nose with his hand. As he sat there in the darkness that was only broken by the fine rays of moonlight cutting in through the window, he absently traced his gaze across Seifer's half-uncovered form. The blond seemed completely dead to the world, and he appeared to be resting peacefully. His broad, naked chest was heaving in a calm, steady rhythm that was only disrupted when Seifer would shift every so often, his muscular arm drifting across the covers as if the blond was searching for something in his slumber. For a brief second, Squall forgot about his splitting headache as he watched his friend sleeping, and he didn't even realize that his formerly tight expression had suddenly become gentle and his eyes glossed over with emotion.

'_He... really __**is **__a good guy.'_

Knowing full well that Seifer had made no attempt at taking physical advantage of him in his intoxicated state, Squall had to admit to himself once more that the blond's intentions truly had to be noble and sincere in nature. Of course, he hadn't _honestly _ expected Seifer to abuse his trust like that, and yet it was comforting to know that his faith in the blond hadn't been misplaced.

'_I guess I should have known, huh... Maybe I'm the slow one here, after all.'_

Almost hesitantly, the brunette now reached out his hand and brushed his scraped-up knuckles along Seifer's jawline with a touch that was as light and unobtrusive as a feather.

'_I'm sorry... for being such an ass this morning. I know none of this is your fault, but I just... can't help it. I don't know what's wrong with me.'_

Sighing, Squall drew his legs up to his chest and rested his forehead upon his kneecaps. He was exhausted, but for some reason, he knew that he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep tonight. Honestly, he felt like shit, and he was well aware that his little wine binge was at least partly to blame for that. Nevertheless, he also realized that his insomnia was about something far more significant than a few glasses of alcohol; since Jeff's assault, he'd been overwhelmed with memories of Kato's constant abuse, and the less he tried to think about his stepfather raping him, the more powerful the mental images would become, as if they were just festering in the deep, dark crevices of his mind.

'_I don't know what to do anymore... I just want to make it stop. I can't keep thinking about this much longer, or I'm going to go fucking insane. I can feel it. I need to do something... I just don't know what.'_

Squall raised his chin, silently gluing his gaze to the pale, scarred insides of his wrists. He could feel an echo of a very familiar urge growing within the shadows of his heart, but before it had a chance to truly unfold, Squall sharply shook his head and balled his hands to fists as he pressed them against his shins.

'_Get a hold of yourself.'_

There were times when Squall wasn't entirely sure whether he was the one who was in control of his body, or whether his body was controlling _him_. He hadn't necessarily made a conscious decision not to cut himself anymore, and yet he had been denying his skin that urgent need to tear and bleed and be drained of the chaos within him. Squall couldn't have said why he had chosen to leave his wrists untouched lately; perhaps Laguna's knowledge of his cutting habit had made a difference. Perhaps it hadn't. Either way, he felt like he had to regain control. Not just over his body, but his life as well. He couldn't even have said when he had lost said control, or whether he had ever had it to begin with, but he knew that things had to change. He still vividly remembered the last time he had taken a blade to his wrists – or rather, the fact that he _didn't _remember. The night he had awoken with his own hands covered in blood and his brain wiped of memories had caused him to realize that something inside of him had obviously cracked. He was slowly losing his grip on reality, on everything he had been trying to protect, and he was more scared than he wanted to admit.

'_I can't keep going like this. Something needs to happen, before I completely lose my fucking mind.'_

He let out a small sound of discomfort, but nothing else, not wanting to disturb his friend's sleep. Calmly, he remained sitting in bed for a while longer, his right cheek folded against his knees as he drowned within the constant noise inside his head. There was a loneliness spreading within him as he sat there that he didn't understand; he knew he wasn't alone, and yet the knowledge that he couldn't share his darkest secrets with anyone, alive or dead, made him feel like the loneliest person in the world.

'_... Stop being pathetic.'_

Squall straightened up and turned abruptly, overwhelmed by the sudden urge to move and clear his head. As he tried to slide to the edge of the mattress without causing Seifer to wake up, he unexpectedly felt a strong hand closing around his forearm.

"... Hey."

The brunette flinched at the sound of a husky, drawling voice cutting through the silence that enveloped him, uttering that single syllable that stopped him dead in his tracks. Surprised, he veered around and found Seifer wide awake, holding on to his arm with a solemn expression on his face.

"Where are you going?"

There was no confrontation to Seifer's inflection, only a subdued, quiet concern that was barely noticeable. His eyes were bright despite the darkness in the room, and Squall thought that he looked more awake and alert than he should have.

"Just getting up for a bit," the brunette finally explained in a manner that was supposed to sound casual, but even though he kept his voice low, he somehow felt like he was shouting.

"What's wrong?" Seifer asked instinctively, suddenly dragging his thumb across the inside of Squall's arm, which he was still holding on to. The brunette accredited the soothing touch with an odd sort of stare, and ultimately, a sigh.

"Nothing," Squall answered with a quick jerk of his head from side to side, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you up."

"Don't worry about that," the blond said immediately. He wasn't smiling, and yet Squall thought that his emerald eyes looked kinder and more affectionate than they ever had before. "Can't sleep?"

Squall considered deflecting the question or simply lying to the blond, but something inside of him had inevitably been touched by Seifer's unwavering persistence, and he decided against it.

"... No," he admitted, his face expressionless. "I can't."

The brawny blond gazed up at him for a few moments in response to that honest, unguarded answer. Squall reciprocated the blond's stare with an air of wariness. Subconsciously, he noticed that Seifer's hair – which was normally brushed back in a carefully considered fashion – was mussed up and almost shaggy looking, softening the hard, angular lines of his face. As Squall took in that change in Seifer's edgy appearance with curiosity, he suddenly noticed how a spark of determination came alight in the blond's watchful eyes.

"Put on your clothes. Let's go to the beach."

"What?" Squall shot back incredulously as he arched his brows over Seifer's outlandish suggestion. "The _beach_? Are you nuts? It's the middle of the night!"

"Your point?" the blond rebutted bluntly, his unimpressed gaze never straying from Squall's skeptical blue eyes.

"But..."

"What? Do you have something more important to do?"

Irritated by the blond's teasing manner of speaking, Squall growled, "Of course not, but—"

"Alright then. Quit putting up a fuss and let's go."

Too stunned to even be pissed off, Squall watched how Seifer let go of his arm and bounced out of bed with a kind of energy that clearly belied his lack of quality sleep as of late. The blond was already hopping into his jeans and jerking a fitted, dark blue sweater over his head while the brunette was still sitting amazed in the middle of the mattress.

"Come on," Seifer ordered enthusiastically as he tossed Squall the pants and shirt that had been resting at the foot of the bed. "Quit dick-dancing around and get dressed. I'll grab us a blanket from the living-room real quick."

He strode out of the room, leaving a confused looking Squall to finally move his feet out onto the floor and hesitantly start working his way into his clothes. The dark haired boy found that his light, grey colored hoodie smelled of hearty Italian food, red wine and Seifer's aftershave – a blend of scents that was much more endearing than anything Squall could remember to ever have experienced before. There was a sudden stillness that overcame him as he stood there, his chin inclined against his chest, simply breathing and listening to the raging chaos inside his head slowly dying down.

'_This whole place... I don't know why, but everything seems easier to deal with here. I think I'm just freaking out about nothing. Ugh... shit. I didn't mean to worry him. This is stupid. We should just go back to bed.'_

Suddenly feeling silly for brooding in bed until he'd unintentionally managed to wake Seifer up, Squall wanted nothing more than to tell the blond to go back to sleep and pretend that nothing had happened. Thus, the moment the older boy re-entered the room with a blanket tucked under his arm, Squall raised one hand to stop him.

"You really don't have to do this, alright, I'm fine," the brunette declared hastily, shaking his head. "Let's just go back to bed and—"

Seifer, however, had apparently decided that words had become completely meaningless where his brunette lover was concerned, because he shut Squall up quite effectively by grabbing a hold of his collar, yanking him close and pressing a hard kiss onto his lips.

"... Let's go."

Wide eyed and slack jawed, the brunette gazed upon Seifer as he unceremoniously let go of his shirt and took a few steps around him to unlock the porch door. The blond didn't bother to order Squall to follow him outside; instead, he clutched the dark haired boy's hand and drug him along, out onto the porch and into the dunes.

Squall's boots made crunching noises that seemed to drown in the sound of the wind as they were trotting through the sand. The night air was cool and quiet, arched by a sky that was jet black and sprinkled with stars. A nearly full moon illuminated the dune grass that was swept by the sea breeze as they slowly made their way towards the water. The ocean seemed vast and dark as it unfolded before them, moving with the sway of the tides. The brunette continued to follow Seifer's lead as his eyes took in the impressive scenery, and he almost bumped into the blond when he came to an abrupt halt.

"Let's sit right here," Seifer suggested, pointing to a patch of beachfront that was guarded against the currents of the wind by a shallow set of dunes. The ocean was only a few steps away, its waters beating into the earth with a sound that made Squall's spine tingle. In the end, he figured that perhaps this vastness of the world around him and the relative insignificance of his own problems was exactly what he had needed to see tonight. The fact that Seifer seemed to have sensed this made him feel both grateful and terrified, because he was slowly starting to wonder if the blond understood him much better than he had ever imagined.

'_He's so close... much closer than anyone I know. I don't think I like it... because I don't want him finding out what's going on, and I don't wanna lie to him all the time... but it's not like I can turn back now. It's too late for that. Maybe it was always too late... because I tried to get rid of him more than just once, and he's still here. I guess he really meant it when he said he's not going anywhere. And at this point... I don't want him to leave.'_

So the brunette sat down without a word, stretching his legs before him as he dug his fists into the sand. He didn't complain when Seifer huddled against him, nor when the blond threw the heavy blanket across both of their shoulders. The older boy's larger body felt warm and solid against his own, offering a kind of heat that no blanket in the world would ever measure up to. Squall blinked in surprise when the blond curled one arm around his left thigh, pulling him as close as physics would allow, and he could feel the other boy's breath lingering between them as their faces were suddenly mere inches apart.

"You warm enough?" Seifer asked in a hushed voice, his lips nearly brushing Squall's temple as he turned his head to study his companion. The brunette could feel his heart involuntarily skipping a few beats as he was overtaken by the blond's closeness in an entirely new way.

"Uh... I'm fine," Squall responded with a small, embarrassed stutter to his voice, and the blond could tell that he meant it. Satisfied, he let his gaze drift out towards the sea, and he breathed a small noise of adoration.

"Man, I love it out here," the eighteen year old said. "It's probably my favorite place in the world, and that's saying somethin' right there. I used to go out here a lot at night and watch the stars when I was a kid. It kind of makes you wonder how many there are, and if there's anything at the end of the universe, you know? If there even is an end to it at all."

Squall only nodded in return, unable to find the right words to express just how much he understood Seifer's love of this small, secluded getaway. Curiously, he tilted his head into his neck to stare up at the stars, fascinated by the light they emitted even in the most pitch black of nights.

"Hey, look!" Seifer suddenly exclaimed with a yelp of excitement. "A shooting star!"

Indeed, the brunette managed to catch just the briefest glimpse of a dying asteroid as it seemingly dropped from the sky. Unlike his friend, however, Squall couldn't muster any kind of enthusiasm for the sight. As he watched that sharp glint of bright light rush towards the horizon, he could feel an ache in the center of his chest, and he quickly turned his gaze away. As much as he had been fascinated with the children's book "The Lion and the Shooting Star" that his mother had apparently been given by Laguna at some point or another, he'd never actually enjoyed a shooting star sighting. He considered it something sad and almost tragic, never realizing that his own personality was much too similar to that of a martyr shooting star from a book written for the young and innocent.

"Did ya make a wish?" the blond now asked him curiously, sensing nothing about the aversion stirring inside his friend.

"No," Squall mumbled callously as he ground the heels of his boots deeper into the grains of sand below. "Why would I?"

"Why not? Can't hurt, can it?" Seifer shrugged. "_I_ made a wish."

Cocking a brow at his friend, Squall replied skeptically, "You did?"

"Yup," the blond said with a wide grin as he studied Squall's face. "Did it work?"

"That depends," his dark haired companion answered dryly. "Did you wish that I thought you were an idiot?"

Chuckling, Seifer elbowed his friend into the side for being such a hopeless wisecrack, but to his disapproval, he noticed that there was no humor in Squall's eyes. The brunette appeared tense and distracted, just as he had for the majority of the past two days. Squall seemed to try to pull himself out of his bad mood, but whatever was weighing on his mind was obviously far beyond his conscious control. It hurt Seifer to realize that the brunette was still trying to fool him, despite everything they'd been through. Then again, he figured that perhaps Squall simply wasn't used to sharing the load with someone else, because he'd always dealt with his problems all alone.

'_Yeah, there's just one problem with that, princess... you're not alone anymore.'_

"... You wanna know what I wish?" Seifer suddenly asked quietly, a trace of melancholy in his inflection. "I wish you would just tell me what's wrong with you."

The gentle way in which Seifer had voiced his words struck something in Squall's psyche, and his features fell momentarily. The blond was simply staring at him, his eyes never straying from Squall's face. Unsure of what to say, the brunette shrugged evasively, but Seifer still noticed him swallowing visibly.

"We've been over this," Squall answered, almost physically trying to sound annoyed. "There's nothing wrong with me."

"Then why do you always sleep like shit?" Seifer pried.

"I couldn't sleep because I had a headache," the dark haired boy explained with an eye-roll. "I'm not used to drinking, that's all. It's not some big fucking mystery or anything."

The seventeen year old wasn't lying, per se, and yet he might as well have been, because the effect remained the same. Seifer gave him a meticulous, stern look, before declaring calmly, "You should really know better than to bullshit me by now. You know I won't stop pestering you 'til you tell me the truth, no matter how long it takes. I know you, Squall. You never sleep well. It wasn't just tonight."

"What do you expect?" Squall hissed back in a tone of annoyance. "I just have a lot on my mind, okay? Some people just don't sleep well. It's not a big deal."

"It's a big deal to _me_," Seifer declared. "If there's something on your mind that keeps you from getting a good night's sleep, why won't you tell me what it is?"

"Because I don't wanna talk about it, that's why!" the brunette snapped. "Not everything I think about is your business, alright?"

"Well," Seifer sighed, not sounding nearly as exasperate as he felt, "That's honest, I suppose, but I'm afraid that's really not going to cut it anymore. I'm done, Squall. I've had enough, okay? I'm not gonna sit here any longer and pretend that I can't see that something is fucking _killing_ you from the inside out. I can _tell_, Squall, and I'm not just going to ignore it like everyone else around you."

"Then don't, okay?" Squall offered coldly as his expression became closed and he physically pulled away from Seifer. "Do what you want, I don't give a shit."

"Do what I want? What I _want_ is for you to be happy and have a good time, idiot," the tall blond groaned, grabbing Squall's chin to turn it towards himself. "_That's_ what I want, don't you fucking get that?"

"I _am_ having a good time," Squall insisted, his voice colored by frustration.

"No, you aren't," Seifer denied stubbornly. "You're thinking about stuff."

"I'm _always_ thinking about stuff!" the brunette barked at him aggressively as he slapped Seifer's hand away. His raised voice was hitching in his throat now as his body became incensed with rage that had never truly been directed towards Seifer. "It's called having a _brain_, you fucking moron! Is that really so hard for you to understand? Why can't you use _your _brain, for _once_, and get it into your _fucking_ head that I don't wanna talk to you? Give me a goddamn break and keep your bullshit to yourself, you piece of—"

"_Shut up!_"

To his shock, Squall suddenly found himself thrown backwards onto the ground, held down by Seifer's hands that pinned his shoulders into the sand. The blond was hovering above him, staring down at the boy who was keeping far more secrets from him than Seifer would ever begin to know. Squall narrowed his eyes threateningly as he cut his gaze upwards, fully expecting his companion to appear angry, annoyed or frustrated, but what he found was something so entirely different that all of his explosive, directionless anger instantly died within him.

'_What...'_

Seifer's tanned, handsome features were soft and filled with a kind of profound, gut-wrenching sadness that Squall couldn't understand, because he had never seen anything like it before. Perhaps he had _wanted_ Seifer to be furious with him, if only because it was the one, single human reaction to his abrasive attitude that would have made sense to Squall's damaged mind. It was all he knew – all he had ever learned.

So he laid there, waiting in silence for a kind of backlash that would never come. His blue eyes defiantly refused to break free from Seifer's green ones, holding their gaze with a stupid kind of strength that was yet unbroken, but no matter how hard he tried, in the end, he couldn't manage to stay focused on the person who was sitting right on top of him. As his senses scattered, he could hear the waves breaking on the dunes and the rocks nearby, and the cries of the seagulls that circled tirelessly above them. There were so many powerful memories he associated with those sounds – so many nightmares filled with blood, silent screams and suffering. His tragic fate had been sealed on that beautiful evening on the beach, years ago, when his mother had become Kato's wife, and Squall had somehow become the twisted man's property. All the restrained emotions that had been building up inside of him since that day suddenly closed in around him as he laid there in the sand, confronted with his own instability, and despite all his desperate efforts, he could no longer hold his demons at bay.

The moment Squall became overwhelmed by the brutal mental images that his brain had stored as sick little keepsakes for many years to come, Seifer saw his pale face twisting with agony. The brunette fought to choke back his tears, but his emotions showed clearly in his grey-blue eyes as they became narrow, fixed and dark with pain. When Seifer became aware of that abrupt, shocking change in Squall's expression, he immediately leaned down to the dark haired boy and dug his forearms into the sand at the sides of the brunette's head, placing his palms against the younger male's temples.

"Shhh, Squall," the blond whispered as he felt Squall jerking beneath him, his face contorted by years of despair that Seifer knew nothing about and yet sensed all the same. "Shhh. It's okay."

But Squall, who was collapsing within himself, only shook his head with a sharp, subconscious twitch of muscle, biting back indistinct sounds of horror.

"... Tell me," Seifer finally urged in a low, breathless voice as he, too, had to wrestle up whatever intestinal fortitude he could call his own in order not to start crying. "By God, please, just _tell me_."

Squall, however, only continued to shake his head, even when Seifer brought their foreheads together, as if trying to distract the brunette from the pain that was cutting through him with shocking brutality. With a helpless grimace, he murmured soothingly, "It's okay. You can say it. Just let it out. It's alright. I promise you, it's alright."

"No," the smaller boy groaned as he wrenched his eyes shut, wracked by the pain and tragedy that his once untainted, young soul had never deserved. "I can't... I _can't._.."

"Why? Why can't you tell me what's wrong?" Seifer ground out in a pleading, almost desperate tone. "I'm not trying to hurt you, Squall, I promise. Please, just tell me. _Please_."

The brunette flinched at the sound of Seifer's heartbreaking plea, but at this point, there wasn't enough fight left in him to even make up an excuse anymore. He wanted to stop lying, to stop pretending that his life wasn't an implosion of violence and madness, streaked by his own harrowing guilt and feelings of inadequacy... but Squall firmly believed that his relationship with Seifer would never survive such honesty. He had always hated lies and deceit, more than anything, and yet, when everything was said and done, he was the worst liar of them all. Squall knew this, but he couldn't change what his life had become. Deep down, he realized that his own existence would come to an end the very moment he would tear down his own defenses and admit that all this time, he'd been reduced to nothing but a sum of his stepfather's cruel desires and his oblivious mother's needs.

Still, he knew that he was sinking, and if he didn't reach out for something, _anything_, he might never be able to turn back, and all his battles waged and sacrifices made would have been in vain.

"Please, Squall, just let me help you," Seifer continued to beg, his voice cracking now as he took a few sniffling breaths and groaned against Squall's cheek. "Please. Tell me what's wrong. _Please._ You can't do this on your own. Nobody can be this goddamn strong all the time... _nobody. _Please, I just want to help. _Please_. What is it, Squall? What?"

"... My... head... is... so full of _shit_..._" _Squall finally whispered as his breath became heavy inside his chest, the words so tense that Seifer could barely hear them. "It... It's so noisy... all the _time_. It's so... loud... and I can't... I can't make it stop. I want to cut myself, just so it'll go away, but I... I'm scared. I'm scared I'm losing my mind. I don't know... I don't know what's going on. I can't... do this anymore. I just want to make it _stop, _but I don't know _how_. Please, just... just make it stop."

For the very first time since they had met in that parking lot seemingly years ago, loving and hating each other until neither one could imagine their own existence without their chaotic relationship, Squall had asked another human being for help. He hadn't done it in some selfless way in which he would request assistance for someone else, like for his father after the accident by the park – no, this time, Squall had asked for help for himself... for some kind of way to drive the shadows out of his head before his mind would be so far gone that it could no longer return to a state of sanity. The magnitude of that gesture would have been lost on most, but not on Seifer. The blond understood that Squall had to be nearing his own self-destruction for him to request anyone's help, and there was no way in hell that he was going to forsake the younger male now.

Even so... there was only one thing he knew that could bring any human's mind to a complete standstill, one act that could stop the hands of time altogether– but he'd never been more scared to step over that boundary, because this was the first time in his life that he had anything to lose.

'_The only thing that's as powerful as your head... is your heart. There's nothing else. There never was. I want to help you, and I want to make you forget all the shit you've had to go through, but I don't want you to think that I'm doing it for some kinda fucked up reasons. If I do this the wrong way... at the wrong time... I might do more harm than good.'_

And as Seifer slowly, gradually kissed his way across Squall's nose and cheeks, experiencing the weight of his own emotions in a manner he had never thought possible, he _wanted_ to make it stop – he wanted to make Squall feel as good as he deserved, but at this point, he had run out of options. He was no psychologist, and honestly, he had no idea what Squall's fragile psyche truly needed, but perhaps it was better that way.

Because in the end, they would have never made it to this point if they had played by the rulebook.

"I can make it stop," the blond whispered in a firm, and yet unsure voice as he raked his right hand through Squall's hair and stoically continued to brush his lips across the brunette's marred skin. "I can make you think about nothing other than what's right in front of you... but... it's not a permanent solution, and you need to trust me, and you need to understand that I would never hurt you... or things will only get worse."

"I don't care about permanent," Squall only ground out with a sharp, aborted breath as his hands suddenly found Seifer's shirt and clawed it tightly while his face twisted once more. "I don't _care_. I'm so... _tired_... of caring. I... I don't even know how I got here. I-I... I thought... that I shouldn't... that I shouldn't have been born, that my mother should have just... gotten rid of me, and none of this would have happened. I don't... I don't know why I'm still here. Nothing makes any... _any_ fucking _sense_. I never wanted to trust anyone... _never_... but... I... I trust _you_... I trust you so much that it scares me more than dying... Because... I'd rather be dead than be betrayed."

When those words finally spilled from Squall's tongue, Seifer's heart flooded with a blinding, brilliant kind of love, and he realized for the very first time that he had won the dark haired boy's heart long before he had ever dared to ask for it. As he was hovering there, his large body pressed against the lean brunette beneath him, he understood that he was the only person who had ever come this far – the only person who could hold Squall together before he would fall apart at the seams.

"Squall," the blond whispered with a long sigh that was heavy with love and sadness, his green eyes searching the brunette's face as they, too, filled with emotion, "I don't know how you got here, either, or what you had to go through to make it this far. I don't know why shooting stars make you look sad, or why you can't sleep at night. I don't know why you want to hurt yourself, or how it ever got that bad. I don't know what happened to you, or what I could have done to stop it. I guess, when it comes down to it, I really don't know much of anything... but... I do know that I _love_ you, more than anyone I've ever known, and I know that I will never betray you, _ever_, not in this lifetime or any other. I _promise_."

Squall didn't blink, and he didn't say a word, but when Seifer watched the quiet trail of tears running down the brunette's temples and melting into the sand beneath him, he realized that he had made a difference. The only guy in his life who had ever managed to touch his heart was crumbling in front of him, and finally, Seifer knew, without the slightest shadow of a doubt, that he could prevent it from happening. He possessed the strength and dedication that Squall needed, and he knew exactly what to do to keep the brunette's mind with him, so close that the world could turn to ash and smoke around them, and they would never even care. He didn't know if Squall realized what he was suggesting, but at this point, he figured that there was only one way to find out.

"I... I'm s-sorry... I..." Squall suddenly stammered, looking lost as his fingers tensed around Seifer's shirt and his gaze became unfocused. "I'm so... fucked up... I... I don't know what's wrong with me, I'm acting like a kid, I... S-shit... I just don't know what to do, I..."

"But I _do_," Seifer whispered with the confidence of many more years than he could call his own, and his eyes suddenly flickered as brightly as the stars above. "I'm here. I'll help you. I'll make you forget whatever it is you want to forget. You just have to let me."

And with those words, Seifer wrapped his arm around Squall's torso and pushed himself off the ground, lifting the brunette up onto his feet as he rose to a standing position. The blond's hands were sure from years of experience, and his touch was firm when he dug his fingers into Squall's lower back without urgency. The shorter boy leaned against him with a small groan, his forehead inclining against Seifer's chest as Squall slowly dropped his hands to his sides. There was something soothing and gratifying about the feeling of Seifer's larger body molding itself against his own, about his arms snaking around him and pulling him tight until the shallow breaths that lingered between them seemed to melt into one. There was so much volatile heat in their relationship, so much longing that neither of them fully understood, but when Seifer's strong hands eventually pushed underneath Squall's shirt, feeling the soft, cool skin beneath with his fingertips, they both realized that this had never been about understanding anything.

'_I don't care what happens tomorrow... Tonight, I'll make you forget __**everything **__you've ever known.'_

Seifer wanted nothing more than to distract Squall from the pain that was ripping the brunette apart from the inside out, and turn it into something so entirely different that the younger male's body would never long for a razorblade's touch ever again. Truthfully, Seifer didn't know if he was thinking straight anymore – the question of whether he should or shouldn't do this suddenly seemed no longer relevant – but he knew that Squall was the only slash of color in this world, which had been blown to black and white a long time ago, and he knew that he would rather die than allow the brunette to live just one more day without knowing how beautiful and loved and wanted he really was.

"... Are you sure that you trust me?"

Squall could feel the raw, almost nervous tint to Seifer's question as much as he could feel the older male's pulse pounding through his skin when his face pressed against the blond's jugular. For all it was worth, Squall had no healthy concept of the word 'trust', yet for the first time in his life, the brunette wasn't scared of being hurt or left behind. It was all that he knew right now, and all that he needed... and at least for tonight, it was good enough.

Letting out a sigh as the harsh tightness within his chest subsided, Squall gently backed out of their embrace. Then, he raised both of his hands and hesitantly reached for Seifer's face, and as he slowly lifted his gaze, he saw the blank surprise that suddenly radiated from the blond's features. Something inside of Squall was chuckling at the sight; of course, of all things in this world, this was probably the last that Seifer had expected from him.

'_I don't... care. I'm tired... of doing what's expected from me.'_

"S... Squall...?"

Without even so much as a breath of a word in response, the brunette curled his right forearm around the nape of Seifer's neck, and he used his leverage to gradually inch the taller male's head down to his level. Ignoring whatever else the eighteen year old might have wanted to stutter, Squall bore his burning blue eyes into the blond's for just one brief, intense second, before he finally pulled their faces together and kissed Seifer for the very first time.

As the blond's mind went white and every inch of his body flooded with a charring kind of heat that he didn't even know he could feel, it suddenly became crystal clear to him that Squall's response required no words at all. And yet, when the brunette withdrew his lips for a moment, exhaling with a rough hiss, Squall defied any doubt there might have been as he choked out a very quiet, and almost soundless, "... Yes."

Groaning, Seifer yanked his lover close, his rational thought process completely buried beneath the vortex of emotions that came rushing in to him. His right hand clawed the back of Squall's head, and he shoved his mouth to the brunette's ear as he made a vow he would never break, so long as he had a heart still beating inside his chest.

"I'll make it go away, I swear. I will hold you until there are no more damn shooting stars in the sky, and no more fucked up dreams in your head, and you can't even remember why you ever wanted to hurt yourself in the first place. I promise, Squall," Seifer growled coarsely as his lips parted and moved to Squall's, and he poured all of his desperate passion into that single kiss, knowing that he was about to take the biggest leap of faith of his life, placing all of his trust into an act of love that he hoped would drive out even the darkest of shadows.

... Never knowing that he had no concept of what darkness truly was.

* * *

Ah, if you guys only knew how long the last part of this chapter took me. I never thought it'd be such a pain in the arse. I think it's obvious they love each other, but in a much less refined way than the typical boy-love story. At least I tried to stay away from the super-sugary-sweet mush stuff. Because I cannot stand it. Then again, this all sounds pretty mushy to me, regardless, so perhaps this was just an epic fail.

Anyway, I think you can all tell what comes next, if it wasn't obvious. Let's just say the greater part of the next chapter will likely not be on this website.

Hint, hint.


	38. Beautiful

-:-

**Chapter 38  
****Beautiful**

"_You need your mind completely blown to pieces. And I will do just that."_

**-:-**

It's like my whole life never happened

When I see you, it's as if I never had a thought

I know this dream, it might be crazy

But it's the only one I've got.

"_Emotionally Yours" – Bob Dylan_

-:-

"_Hey. How many guys exactly have you slept with, anyway?"_

"_What? What kinda dumbass question is that?"_

"_I'm just curious. I mean, I always thought you were straight as an arrow when I saw you at school, but..."_

"_But?"_

"_Well, obviously you're __**not**__, and you... uh... I mean, not like you don't already know this, but... you're, uh, really good at this. I'm guessing you must have a lot of experience. After all, you were the first guy I ever slept with, and it barely hurt at all."_

"_Did you __**want **__it to hurt?"_

"_No, of course not!"_

"_Then stop asking stupid questions."_

"_I just... I mean... I always get the feeling that you don't care about any of this. It's like, you're here, but you're not. Every time we have sex, I get the impression that you just go through the motions. You don't get me off because you honestly give a shit how I feel. You just do it because you're good in bed and you know it, and because you've got some kind of point to prove. You don't care about me. In fact, I don't think you care about anyone. You care about making an impression, and that's all."_

"_... Look, do you wanna fuck, or do you wanna act like this is some episode on the Care Bears?"_

"_I just want you to give a shit. Is that so much to ask?"_

"_Actually, it is. You really wanna know what I think about all this? I'm thinking that you should find yourself another dude. If I wanted to deal with this fucking chick drama, I assure you I'd be sleeping with someone who's got tits."_

"_Just because I'm a guy doesn't mean all I wanna do is fuck, okay? Believe it or not, life isn't just about getting the next piece of ass! I mean, Jesus, we never do anything together that doesn't involve sex, and you barely even talk to me at school!"_

"_I hate to be the one to break this to ya, but just because I fuck you every now and then doesn't mean I give a rat's ass about your 'feelings'. I'm not looking for a boyfriend, or anything else along those lines. I'm not planning on pulling some kind of gay 'coming out' stunt, whether with you or anyone else. I'm pretty sure I made that crystal clear before we started messing around."_

"_But..."_

"_Seriously. Are you on your fucking period or something? What's with all the bitching and complaining?"_

"_You know, you don't have to be such a dick, Seifer."_

"_And you don't have to be such a damn crybaby, Vince. If you want someone to care about you, by all means, feel free to sit on someone else's dick. It's not gonna hurt __**my**__ feelings, I assure you. This is about sex to me, nothing else, and I never made a big secret out of it. So take it or leave it. It's all the same to me."_

"_... One of these days, you'll regret being such a heartless bastard, you know."_

"_Right. If that day ever comes, I'll be sure to send you a postcard."_

"_You think it's funny, but it isn't. I'm telling you, someday, even __**you**__ are gonna fall in love with someone, and you'll see what it's like to want something you can't have. You think you're immune to it, because you've never given a shit about anyone but yourself, but mark my words, one day, someone's going to come along and break your heart to fucking pieces."_

"_... I can't wait."_

-:-

**Important - This is not the entire Chapter 38!**

This is only the beginning of this chapter. I cannot post the entire thing on this site, because it contains explicit sexual content (well, as explicit as I can write it, anyway, lol). If you wish to read it, please follow the link on my author profile. If that, for some reason, doesn't work, search my username redrosesblack on LiveJournal.

I hope you enjoy what I've written. It wasn't easy, and I wanted to get it just perfect, which is simply not possible... but I suppose I am satisfied. I got so emotional writing it, so I hope I can convey some of that to you. It's been a long, rocky road for our two boys, and I hope it was worth it.

Please enjoy.


	39. Gravity

-:-  
**  
Chapter 39**  
**Gravity**

"_Don't ever apologize for something that someone else did to you."_

-:-

I'm falling apart  
But it's all a start  
Of a brand new day  
A chance to play  
The message of my heart  
If I turn back  
I will self-destruct  
My path is not the same as yours  
You have to understand

Cause heaven's only here when I'm near you  
That's the reason, baby,  
Why I fear you.

"_Will you Move On" – Sofia Loell_

-:-

He had awoken to the distant, soothing sounds of rain and ocean waves crashing ashore on countless treasured occasions over the years of his childhood, and yet, he could tell that something was off this time. Even with his mind dulled from sleep, there was an alertness to his movements as he rolled over in bed and blinked against the blurriness as it slowly faded from his emerald eyes. It was light out, but not the kind of cool brightness that Seifer would have expected from a typical Dollet beach morning; the curtain to his bedroom had been partially drawn shut, but it billowed in a breeze that was harsh as it cut through a small sliver of space between the sliding porch door and its wooden frame.

"What the..."

Shaking his head, the blond sat up, realizing for the first time that he was completely naked, covered only by a heap of tousled sheets. The memories came flooding back then, and the echo of feeling his lover, Squall, curled up peacefully in his arms was still freshly imprinted in his mind.

'_Squall.'_

He didn't call out his companion's name, knowing full well by now that Squall had made it a habit not to answer him if he could in any way help it. Seifer wasn't struck by fully scaled panic as he normally would be over the discovery of his companion's absence, and yet he couldn't help but feel unsettled. He didn't necessarily believe that the brunette, who frightened so very easily, had ran off without a word after their romance-filled night, but nevertheless, he wondered why Squall was no longer in the room with him. As he glanced at his watch, Seifer realized that it was still early; in fact, it was barely 7 o'clock on a morning that, by the blond's standards, should have been spent in bed.

'_Does that guy ever sleep? Jesus. How does he even function like this?'_

Groaning, Seifer peeled himself out of the sheets, albeit with the sole purpose of finding Squall and dragging him back under the covers for a snuggle and a well-earned nap. Between the rain outside, the drama of the past few days, and their general lack of quality sleep as of late, the groggy eighteen year old found himself to be beyond a state that could have simply been described as 'tired'.

'_I don't think my life has ever been this fucking complicated. I don't even remember what easy feels like anymore.'_

The heaviness of his own emotions and the memory of Squall's breakdown the night before were stirring more forcefully in Seifer's mind, now that he was closer to a state of being fully awake. He remembered holding Squall, kissing him, truly _experiencing_ his body for the very first time, loving him for what had seemed like a strange, shifting mixture of seconds and hours. He had wanted it to last, not just one night, because one night was meaningless. Still, part of him realized that sometimes, one night, one _second_, was all that it took to change someone's life forever.

And Seifer knew – knew that his relationship with Squall had been redefined last night, that both of their lives had been altered irreversibly when they had taken their physical attraction to each other to a frighteningly new level. Honestly, he wasn't sure what reaction to expect from Squall now, in this light of a brand new day. The brunette had seemed enthusiastic, affectionate and trusting to him the night before, but Seifer also clearly remembered those moments during which Squall had appeared more scared and traumatized than he should have. He couldn't shake off the feeling that he had missed something about Squall's behavior last night – some crucial detail he had been too blind with love to see.

'_... Alright, enough of that. It's too early to be this fuckin' serious.'_

After a long yawn and a good stretch, Seifer shook his head briskly before hopping into his jeans and slipping on a sweatshirt. He noticed Squall's boots still sitting by the dresser across from the bed, however the brunette's khakis and shirt were nowhere to be found.

'_At least he's not naked. Hmmm... then again...'_

With a quick grin on his lips, Seifer left the bedroom through the porch door and headed out onto the deck. The rain had diminished to a very faint, barely noticeable drizzle that hardly even grazed his skin. Quickly, his feet crossed through the cool, dampened sand, descending the winding path through the dunes towards the ocean. The sky was grey and heavy with clouds above his head, and Seifer could feel the chill of a quickly approaching winter searing through his skin and into his bones.

'_Fuck, it's pretty cold out here. I'm sure it'll start snowing out here soon, too. Where the hell is he...?'_

Finally, he noticed a lone, motionless figure standing by the edge of the sea, their feet submerged ankle-deep in the ever moving, foamy water. Squall was standing only an insignificant distance from the spot where Seifer had cracked open the boy's metaphorical shell under the stars mere hours ago, and as the blond's gaze drifted to the side briefly, he recognized their blanket lying folded up neatly in the sand. His companion had his back turned towards him; the dark haired boy was facing the ocean, the hood of his sweatshirt drawn up over his head, his hands somewhere in front of his body, his pants rolled up to his knees to keep them from getting wet. He looked still and incandescent, shrouded in the fine mist of the shifting waves, like some image of a dream, and yet much too beautiful to be anything Seifer's mind would ever be able to conjure up.

'_... Squall.'_

Seifer approached the brunette with care, even reverently almost, but he did not get too close without making his presence known. After all, he was fully aware of how easily Squall was startled and, consequently, pissed off.

"... Hey. Aren't you getting cold out there?"

Seifer noticed the dark haired boy flinching at the sound of his voice, then swinging around hastily. There was a flash of something hunted in Squall's grey eyes as they collided with his own – a look of being caught red-handed as he hectically snapped the cell phone shut that he had been cradling in front of his chest. As a small crease appeared between Seifer's brows, the blond realized how sadly familiar he was with the guilty conscience he could plainly see all over Squall's face; he, too, had looked this way on countless occasions when he had been caught doing something he clearly wasn't supposed to, but it wasn't an expression he had ever expected to find on his serious, dark haired companion.

'_What the hell...?'_

For a brief moment, they simply stared at each other from across the pale white sand, and Seifer could see Squall's chest rising and falling rapidly as he pressed his arms in front of his torso. The brunette's eyes were wider than normal, his jaw tense as he tightened the line of his wind-chapped lips and stood entirely still.

"What are you doing?" Seifer finally asked, trying to keep his tone free of accusation, and yet not entirely managing.

"Nothing," Squall snapped back, too fast to be convincing. His body shifted agitatedly as he shoved his phone into the front pouch of his hoodie, but he did not move from his position.

"You came out here at the butt crack of dawn, by yourself, to do _nothing_?" the blond retorted, not even attempting to hide his blatant skepticism.

"I wanted to see the ocean, if you really care to know," his opposite admitted grudgingly, casting down his eyes for a split second, before a condescending sneer appeared on his lips. "And it's 7am. That's hardly 'the butt crack of dawn'."

"What were you doing with your phone?" Seifer inquired, not so easily appeased by the younger boy's explanation of simply wanting to take in the scenery.

Squall was scowling at him now, his eyes full of darkness and some kind of anger that was different from what he would usually put on display. Seifer sensed hostility from the brunette, which wasn't entirely unusual, and he didn't understand why the familiar sight bothered him as much as it did, until he abruptly recalled that he had _made love_ to Squall mere hours ago, their dysfunctional relationship sealed by a primal act they had never performed with each other before. It wasn't supposed to be like this – they shouldn't be having a fucking stand-off at the beach after lying naked in each other's arms, clinging on to the love burning so brightly in both of their hearts. Something wasn't right, and suddenly, Seifer wondered if he was the reason for Squall's odd behavior.

'_... Fuck.'_

"Squall. Are you okay?" the blond finally asked, his inflection more gentle and caring this time, as he figured that this should have probably been his initial question to the brunette. Perhaps the younger male was nervous, embarrassed, or - even worse - in pain after having been fucked for the first time. For a moment, Seifer wanted to kick himself for being so insensitive.

"Why do you ask?" Squall grunted, sounding annoyed as he narrowed his eyes, looking neither hurt nor in any way emotionally unsettled.

"... You _know_ why."

The brunette had to ponder that pointed remark, realizing that it startled him more than Seifer was probably aware of. But he knew what Seifer was referring to, and what he _wasn't_, simply because the blond had no clue. Seifer didn't know of the secret terrors and brutality in the dark haired boy's life, and Squall was never going to allow that to change.

"Yeah," Squall responded eventually, seeming more placated than before as he blew out a breath and a small, almost shy blush appeared on his cheekbones as he, too, recalled their lovemaking of the night before. "I'm fine. Thanks."

"Do you wanna come back to bed?" Seifer asked, trying to hide the hopefulness in his question, because he could already guess the boy's answer when Squall suddenly broke their eye contact and stared at the water to his feet.

"... I can't."

Seifer heard the reluctant monosyllables, noted the way Squall kept his gaze low, fidgeting with his phone that he was hiding in the pouch of his shirt. He looked paler than normal, and unusually on edge. Something was off.

"You can't? Why not?" the blond inquired, patiently, for now.

"Because..." Squall mumbled, hesitating, before he started to chew on his lips. "Because I have to get back to Deling City."

"What?" Seifer retorted with a sharp note of incredulity to his voice. "What do you mean? You mean _now_?"

"Yeah. I was thinking of taking the train," Squall explained, his eyes cutting upwards briefly, before being cast to the ground once more as soon as he caught a glance of Seifer's stunned face. "Look, I know you're here to see your grandmother. You don't have to take me back. I don't wanna interrupt your time with her."

"Okay, hold on, back the fuck up. What are you even talking about?" Seifer growled, sounding agitated as he gestured towards the brunette with one hand and scratched his own head with the other. "Why do you suddenly have to go back to Deling City? Where the hell did that come from? That doesn't even make any sense! We just _got_ here!"

The brunette continued to stare at his feet, completely silent now. His face and posture were closed, making him look uncomfortable and defensive. The sight was upsetting Seifer, mainly because he didn't understand.

"Squall. Dammit, answer me!" he ordered with barely restrained heat in his voice.

"... I've been gone long enough. I just need to get back," Squall finally explained, the excuse in his thin words cheap, frustrating and evasive.

"Bullshit," Seifer shot back coldly, ignoring the sour look that flashed across Squall's face as the brunette finally met his gaze. "You've barely been gone for two days, and it's Friday now. You're not missing any school over the weekend, so why are you in such a rush to get back? What's going on? Huh?"

"I... You're... It's... complicated," the younger male responded in a choppy, strained tone of voice, and Seifer could tell that Squall wasn't lying to him, for once. Still, he knew that the dark haired teen could do better than this. He was getting tired of hearing nothing but excuses and provisional half-truths that never really added up to anything.

"Then explain it to me," the older boy ordered firmly as he bore his green eyes into Squall's across the rainy beach. "Tell me what's so fuckin' complicated about it."

"I can't! I _can't_, okay? I can't always explain everything to you," Squall groaned, the words coming louder and more exasperate than before. It was a familiar sight, a familiar sound – so goddamn fucking familiar that Seifer wanted to scream and punch the shit out of the nearest wall.

"Why not?" the older boy snarled, his voice as harsh and impatient as the look on his face. "Why the _fuck_ not?"

"Because... because it's... you're... and I... I..." Squall stuttered, reeling for words. He looked more lost than he had before – more vulnerable. Finally, his useless attempt at explaining himself died in a frustrated breath as he dropped his head.

"You're not making any damn sense, Squall."

To his surprise, Squall cocked his face up lightly, staring at Seifer with an expression of disapproval from beneath his drawn up hood. This time, he remained silent.

"Does it have anything to do with your phone?" Seifer finally deducted after a few moments of considering whether he should even go down that route, and coming to the conclusion that he had little to lose at this point. "Someone called you, didn't they? Who was it? What's going on?"

Looking taken aback and almost offended now, Squall stuttered, "W-what? Nobody, it... I..."

With an expression as unmovable as granite, Seifer said sharply, "Don't lie to me."

"I... I don't know what you're talking about," the brunette muttered, shaking his head, but Seifer saw the bright, scared gleam that had lit up in his eyes.

"I wasn't born yesterday, Squall," the tall blond growled, noting how Squall was clutching his arms in front of the pouch of his hoodie now. "Man the fuck up and quit avoiding the question. Who called you?"

"Nobody!" the brunette shouted with exasperation, but Seifer could tell that he was lying.

"Really? You sure about that? Do you want me to look at your phone and check for myself?"

He saw Squall cringing at those words, and although Seifer would have likely never made true of that threat, he was still grateful that it seemed to have an impact on the brunette.

"I... you're... I... It's not... ugh... shit. Alright. Fine. Whatever. Rinoa. It was Rinoa, okay? Happy now?" Squall admitted in a defeated voice, carefully omitting the fact that the petite brunette girl had not been the only one who had attempted to get a hold of him during his stay at Dollet beach.

"_Rinoa_? _The_ fucking Rinoa Heartilly? The fuck did _she_ want? How does she even have your goddamn number?" his blond opposite demanded, the surprise and irritation in his words less than subtle.

"I don't know how," Squall responded in a tone of annoyance. "I didn't ask, alright?"

"Okay, fine, whatever, but what the fuck did that spineless twat want from you?" Seifer growled.

"She..." Squall started unsurely, before pausing and chewing on the corner of his bottom lip once more. "She asked to meet up with me. In Deling City. Today."

"What? _Why_? What the hell does she want from you? Are you saying you want to go back because of _her?"_

"No," the brunette denied immediately, while shaking his head and lowering his gaze. "That's not it. I... There are other reasons on top of that."

"Wait a minute..." Seifer hissed, screwing up his face as something within his brain suddenly clicked into place. "Hold on. You're not seriously considering _meeting_ her, are you?"

"... I am."

Squall's quiet, monotone answer rang like an explosion inside Seifer's stunned head. As he stared at his pale, lean-framed friend with an expression of outrage, Seifer wanted nothing more than to slap some sense into the stubborn brunette, who had clearly lost his fucking marbles.

"_What_? Are you out of your _fucking_ mind?" the blond finally snarled when the shock had sank in and his voice had somehow returned. "Don't you remember what happened? Who her fucking friends are? What they _did_ to you?"

"What the hell makes you think I could have possibly _forgotten_?" Squall hissed back icily, a sting to his voice that the blond had never heard before. And suddenly, Seifer saw the well of darkness and hatred in his eyes, and he noted the painful bruises stamped into the boy's pale skin with a stab of guilt in his heart.

'_Shit. Why do I always have to open my fuckin' mouth before thinking?'_

"... You're right," the blond apologized in a soft, assuaging tone as he grimaced at his boyfriend, trying to produce something like a smile, which looked sad at best. "That was a dumb thing to say. I'm sorry, Squall."

"No, the fuck you are! You're not sorry!" Squall yelled at him as he dropped his arms to his side and clenched his hands to fists, his abrupt, scorching anger catching the blond off guard. "You don't even know what the fucking word means! You always do this! _All_ the time! Don't fucking tell me you're sorry!"

"I—"

"This isn't your fucking life, okay?!" the younger male shrieked, looking furious and exhausted and alone as he stood in the freezing ocean water that was frothing angrily around his ankles. "You have no right to judge what I do and with whom! You have no right to say _anything!_"

"I... Look, I know it's not my life, Squall, okay?" Seifer attempted to calm the volatile teen. "I'm just worried about you, alright, you shouldn't try to—"

"No! You don't tell me what to do, alright? I can _handle_ this! I'm not a fucking child!"

"Squall—"

"Fuck you!" Squall interrupted him, screaming now, his face contorted painfully. Somehow, he looked at the verge of breaking down in tears. "Fuck you, okay! _Fuck you_!"

'_Christ_...'

With an agonized expression, Seifer rolled his eyes and shook his head, before he suddenly dashed into the water towards Squall. Before the brunette could have processed what had happened, Seifer was already in front of him, grabbing both of the other boy's shoulders with his hands, holding them steady and tight.

"Squall!" Seifer barked at the top of his lungs, pulling the dark haired boy a few inches closer. He noticed how wide-eyed and taken aback the younger male looked when the hood of his shirt suddenly fell from his head onto his shoulders as he tried to shake some sense into him.

"W-What, no, I-"

"_Stop!_" the blond ordered harshly, causing Squall to flinch, although his voice wasn't unkind. "Stop yelling, take a motherfucking breath and _look at me_!"

Silenced now, Squall stared up at the blond, mouthing insults that wouldn't come to him anymore. Seifer was breathing down onto his face, the air coming from his parted lips and flared nostrils warmer than anything that surrounded them. Seifer was as imposing and dominant as he'd always seemed, and yet there was nothing threatening about his closeness. At some point during their whirlwind romance, Squall had stopped fearing Seifer's hands on his body, and he had come to accept the blond's touch as something that was actually soothing in its firmness and stability.

Suddenly, Squall Leonhart didn't know what to say.

"Do you recognize me?" Seifer asked eventually, his tone equally challenging and hopeful. "Do you know who I am? I'm the guy that would walk to the end of the fucking earth for you! I love you, remember? Stop yelling at me! I'm not your fucking enemy."

He saw the shorter boy swallowing, and he noted his eyes cutting to the side in embarrassment as he finally calmed down.

"I know you aren't..." Squall murmured after a few moments of simply avoiding Seifer's gaze.

"Then quit freaking out and just explain to me what has you all worked up like this!" the blond eighteen year old ordered. "I know you're not exactly Mister Chattypants and shit, but at least give it a goddamn try! That's all I fucking ask."

"I _can't_," the dark haired male repeated his dismissal from before with exasperation, causing Seifer's frustration to flare once more.

"Why not, Squall?" Seifer asked evenly, a strange gravity to his inflection. This time, his question left no room for argument, and Squall knew it, too. Biting the inside of his cheeks, he cast down his gaze, staring at Seifer's chest as it was rising and falling rhythmically. His entire world had been built on a concept of rejecting everyone around him, and he'd never even wasted a second thought on it – until he had met Seifer. The brawny, loud-mouthed blond was the one guy Squall hadn't managed to push away... the one guy who meant so much more than the brunette would ever be able to put into words.

"Because..." he started after many moments of silence, his voice suddenly small and broken. His eyes were burning as he tried to keep his vision steady, swallowing his tears. "Because I'm afraid you'll leave if I do."

Stunned, Seifer held in a breath as he watched that glare of fear coming alight in Squall's grey-blue eyes as the boy finally tipped up his gaze to meet his own. Truthfully, Squall looked and _felt _afraid to him, because his body shook subtly underneath Seifer's strong hands. For a long time, the blond simply didn't know how to respond, until his instincts ultimately took charge and he drew Squall against him with a sigh.

"Squall..." Seifer whispered, the name soft on his tongue as he pressed the brunette into himself. "There is nothing you could say that would ever make me leave. _Nothing_."

Seifer could feel the smaller male hesitantly leaning against him, still trembling to his touch. Squall's hands were touching his thighs, clenched to fists. His face was molded against the blond's throat, and when Seifer pulled him even closer, gently cupping his neck and encircling his waist, he suddenly felt the brunette's pulse racing beneath his skin.

"Your heart's going a million miles an hour," the blond murmured, tenderly rubbing the nape of the dark haired male's neck. "What in the world is going on with you, Squall?"

"I don't know..." Squall whispered with honesty.

"Listen to me. You can talk to me about anything, okay? Anything whatsoever. I would never leave you, or think less of you because of it."

'_You say that because you have no idea what I'm hiding from you. If you knew... you'd never look at me the same way again. I'd just be the dumb, pathetic kid that couldn't manage to keep his stepfather from putting his hands on him. You'd feel sorry for me, for a while, and then even that would get old. Who wants to be with someone who's as fucked up as I am? No one. You'd never touch me again if you knew. You'd just think I'm dirty and weak, just another sorry little victim, and you'd be fucking right. You can't fix what he's done... and neither can I. I can only pretend it's never happened.'_

"I'm..." Squall started eventually, closing his eyes as he drowned out the self-deprecating misery inside his own head, "I'm worried about what's going on back home. Laguna's injured because of me, and my mother is worrying herself sick about both of us. She's been spending time with Laguna at the hospital, and I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing. I can't just... _sit_ here and have a vacation... regardless of... of how much I like being out here with you. I just... I'm sorry. I can't. It's not who I am."

The brunette's explanation had been genuine, albeit very much the abridged version of what was _truly_ going on in his chaotic little world. Still, his words had touched and appeased Seifer, for now. He remembered what his grandmother had told him about Squall internalizing all the problems of the people in his environment, somehow making them his own responsibility. Seifer knew that the brunette couldn't help his father, nor make his mother decide on what to do with her newfound high school lover. Nevertheless, he understood why Squall would be concerned and emotionally preoccupied.

"I know," the blond finally acknowledged, the words heavy with a sigh as he loosened his grip on his younger lover. "I understand. I'll take you back home. Let's get some food and stuff and take our time, though. There's no need to rush out of here all crazy and shit."

"No, you really don't have to take me, I—" Squall started, grimacing.

Seifer's refusal, however, was clad in stone.

"I _want _to take you," the blond announced. "End of discussion."

Looking skeptical, Squall continued to attempt to protest. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate Seifer's offer, but the last thing he needed at the moment was to feel guilty over leaving Balamb before the blond was able to see his grandmother again.

"But I really don't think you should just—"

"Hey... I'm not asking for permission here, remember?" Seifer severed his friend's excuses with a wink, referring to that one night at the hospital, when Squall had stubbornly insisted to come to Balamb with him.

"But I—"

"Squall. Seriously," Seifer finally growled, hooking his hand behind the brunette's sinewy neck once more as he yanked their faces closer together and lowered his voice to a more intense level. "Just let it go."

With a frustrated intake of breath and the blond's lips dangerously close to his own, Squall bit back whatever argument he'd been wanting to bring forth, and Seifer knew that he had won this battle. It was a small victory, one almost meaningless in the big picture of things, but for now, the older male was satisfied. It usually took an act of god to get the brunette to agree to anything, so he'd celebrate his triumphs while he could.

Little did either of them know that the real battle had not even begun.

* * *

"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?"

Squall gave Seifer a long, annoyed side-eye following that question. He was sitting in the blond's passenger seat, his right hand on the door handle, his left clutching the keys to his mother's Mercedes. Seifer had driven him to Perkins Park, where Squall had left the black sedan seemingly ages ago. In reality, it had only been a short few days since the accident that had involved him and Laguna, and the pain of it was searing brightly through the brunette's heart as he recalled the bleeding man lying in his arms.

Taking a deep breath as he hastily repressed the memories, Squall quickly shook his head.

"No. I'm fine. Thanks."

Seifer knew that look on his friend's face – that evasive, skittish grimace that adorned his features whenever he was trying to run away from something. Everything inside of him was screaming at him to just grab Squall's arm and pull him back into the vehicle, never letting him go again, but Seifer was painfully aware that the brunette could never be contained like that. He didn't know why it bothered him so much to see the brunette off this afternoon, but for now, he blamed it on being silly and needy and in love, and he decided to leave Squall be. Therefore, with visible reluctance, Seifer watched how the smaller male opened the passenger door.

"Hey," the blond suddenly interrupted the dark haired boy's departure. "Can you come over to my place tonight? I'd really like to take you to dinner or something."

Squall glanced at him from over his shoulder, looking hesitant. He was beautiful even when he was annoyed, tired, and dressed in the same clothes he had worn for days, and Seifer wondered once more how he had ever deserved a chance with this guy.

_'I guess I must have done something right, for once_.'

"Well... it's already almost 4 o'clock," Squall mused. "I gotta take care of this shit with Rinoa, and I'm going to stop by the hospital after that to check on Laguna... Then I still gotta go home and change..."

"Okay, so how about after that, then?" Seifer suggested persistently.

"I..."

The brunette paused, clearly considering to deny Seifer's request, but then something in his face shifted and he finally performed a small nod.

"... Alright."

"Sweet," Seifer whistled, a grin now appearing on his lips, making him look much happier than he had. He didn't understand why Squall had been so quick to give in, but he wasn't going to question the brunette's thought process. "How does 8 sound to you?"

"That's fine," Squall agreed nonchalantly.

"Alright, I'll see ya later then, princess."

"See ya."

As Squall slid out of the truck and slammed the door behind himself, he wondered, not for the first time, what he was doing. He was leaving Seifer behind, by his own free will, and with him the one, small piece of security he had ever known. But as he squared his shoulders, he knew that he couldn't depend on Seifer to protect him – whether from Kato, or anything else in his life that had ever threatened to do him harm.

'_I can't depend on anyone but myself.'_

Slowly, he trudged to his mother's sedan, his boots crunching across the gravel as he absently clicked the car remote to unlock it. As he sat down and started the engine, cringing at the dried specks of blood on the Mercedes' leather seats, he noticed that Seifer was still hanging out in the parking lot. As a matter of fact, the older male hadn't moved an inch from his position. It wasn't until Squall met the blond's eyes and motioned at him to get going that Seifer gave him a thumbs-up and ultimately went on his way.

With a thoughtful, almost melancholic gaze, Squall watched the other male leaving, never understanding why his heart was aching as much as it was. He hadn't forgotten his last night with Seifer, of course, because truthfully, he'd _never_ be able to forget - but he also had no real inkling of how deep his love for the blond had truly grown. Still, he kept thinking about the older male, and with how much caution and gentleness Seifer had been treating him... not just while they'd had sex, but in many other ways, too.

'_I'm guessing he waited around just now because he wanted to make sure the car would start up and whatnot. I don't understand why he always treats me like I'm going to fucking fall apart without his help. Idiot. Why the fuck does he worry so much? Nevermind... I guess I know why. But I wonder if he knows that he's only making things worse.'_

When he realized that he was brooding, Squall hastily shook his head and started heading towards Ward's Diner, alone with himself and the many things on his mind that didn't make any sense to him. For some reason, he wasn't nervous about meeting up with Rinoa, but the concept of facing his mother and his stepfather for the first time since the assault gave him a raging stomachache. Truthfully, he would have rather stayed in Dollet with Seifer forever, making love and pretending that everything was good and well in the world, but at the end of the day, he'd never been that naïve.

'_I can't run away from this.'_

So he did what he'd always done – endure, and hope that someday, things would get better. Maybe not for himself, because in some way they'd already gotten much better than he'd ever thought they would, but for the ones who meant the most to him.

_'This is about Mom and Ell, and their happiness. Nothing else. I don't give a fuck about what happens to me in the end.'_

Still, when Squall finally set foot into the diner that had almost become a second home for him, there was a tightness lacing his throat that made it difficult for him to breathe as his heart beat a staccato against his chest. None of this was easy, or ever had been. At some point, he'd been able to hide the physical wounds inflicted upon him, whether by others or by his own hands, but even that sense of security had ultimately failed him. He was walking around with cuts and scars and shining colors of red and blue that had no place anywhere on his body, but were still in plain sight. He noticed the curious looks he got right away – not that they were anything new, of course, but this wasn't Dollet... this was home, and these were people that he knew. They were people he went to school with... people who might eventually start asking the wrong questions. One of them was Raijin, Ward's overgrown son, and he only gave Squall one long, intense look from behind his small hostess station, before wordlessly disappearing towards the kitchen.

'_... Shit.'_

Squall knew this wasn't good; he was attracting too much attention. He'd been a fool for showing up here in his current, jacked up state. The second Squall considered walking back out and leaving Rinoa to keep what he had originally come here for, however, he could feel a small hand tugging on his biceps.

"Squall!"

He flinched and ultimately froze, turning reluctantly towards the familiar female voice calling his name in a sharp, strident pitch. The moment his emotionless, distant eyes clashed with Selphie's green ones, her hands flew to her mouth.

"Oh, my god," the dark blonde waitress gasped as she saw his face, and her features contorted helplessly. "Squall! What _happened_ to you?"

She was staring at him, looking mortified as her wide eyes took in the full extent of his injuries. His bruises had taken on a more sickly looking reddish-purplish hue over the past two days, and although the swelling on his face had almost completely disappeared, the numerous cuts and scabs clearly had not.

"It's nothing," Squall answered evasively as his head flitted to the side, focusing on some random, colorful fish painting on one of the nearby walls. With a frown of discomfort, he buried his hands in the pockets of his khakis. "I'm fine."

Of course, she wasn't listening. Selphie didn't want to hear his excuses, didn't want to hear how fine he was when someone had clearly beaten the seven shades of shit out of him. She briefly considered touching him once more, but obviously thought better of it, if only because she was worried she might cause him physical pain.

"... Did Seifer do this?" she finally asked, her small, hushed voice filled with horror.

"What?" the brunette shot back, sounding honestly stunned as his gaze met hers once more. "The fuck? No, of course not."

"Thank goodness," she sighed, clutching her chest in relief, and he wondered whether she'd truly thought Seifer capable of injuring him so brutally. Granted, the two of them had always had their problems, and Squall had hit Seifer more than just once, but the blond himself had actually never become violent with him. "But then who _did_? I'll kill them!"

"Don't worry about it," the brunette deadpanned.

"'Don't worry about it'?" she repeated his cold, callous dismissal, looking him up and down in disbelief. "Are you serious? You're like a brother to me, Squally! How could I _not_ worry about it?"

Squall, who'd clearly been oblivious to how much the people around him cared, seemed lost for words for a moment. He wanted to tell her something to reassure her, to make her stop looking at him as if he was about to break, but his mind was completely blank. As they stood in the entryway to the restaurant, simply gazing at each other at a loss for things to say or do, Squall suddenly heard someone clearing his throat.

"... Hey."

It was a deep, baritone, almost brassy sounding voice – one that had never been of many words – and it belonged to a man that Squall had always respected more than most.

'_Ward...'_

The statuesque man had appeared before them in a stained cooking apron, his arms crossed authoritatively in front of his massive chest. Ward was wearing his trademark blue bandana around his head, looking quietly intimidating as usual as his muscles inside the tight, form hugging white t-shirt flexed. His face was expressionless, but even so, Squall could tell that something was off when the man remained silent for several moments, only settling for giving him a long, hard stare.

"Ward," Selphie ultimately uttered the brawny male's name, while her eyes flew from her tall boss to her lean-framed brunette co-worker in anticipation.

"Squall," the former sailor finally said calmly, completely ignoring the girl. "I need to talk to you."

Gulping, the brunette answered in a severed voice, "Of course."

"Come with me."

Squall left a bewildered looking Selphie behind and sheepishly followed the man through the restaurant and into his small, cramped office, where Ward wordlessly motioned him to sit down. The brunette wasn't one to disobey his employer, so he sank into one of the two wooden chairs with a knot in his stomach that was as heavy as a boulder. Ward, meanwhile, remained standing. With a stern expression, the physically imposing man leaned back against his desk that was stacked with piles of business-related papers, measuring the young man in front of him very closely out of piercing blue eyes.

"Ward... I..." Squall started after several moments spent in uncomfortable silence, not sure what to say or what to expect. He was scratching the inside of his shirt-covered left wrist, not even realizing he was doing it. "I'm really sorry for not showing up to work on Wednesday, I—"

"Squall."

The dark haired teen stopped and held his breath when Ward abruptly bit his name in a sharp, commanding tone, and nothing else. His heart sank when he realized that he had probably just blown his one opportunity to retain even a fraction of financial independence from Kato.

'_I fucked it all up. He's going to fire me. Why didn't I pull myself together on Wednesday? I am such a fucking idiot.'_

"Don't ever apologize for something that someone else did to you."

Stumped, Squall stared at the man, unable to determine by that comment whether he was in trouble or not. He'd never seen Ward angry, or even annoyed, and the man usually talked even less than Squall himself did, which was quite a rare accomplishment. Therefore, the brunette honestly wasn't sure what to think. With wide eyes that gave him the look of a frightened child, he gazed upon the man's face, taking in the enormous scar that arrowed all across its left side, and for the very first time, Squall wondered how Ward had come about such a gruesome injury. Somehow, he'd always assumed for it to be a remnant from the man's military days, but he wondered now whether it was, perhaps, testimony to something more tragic than that.

Not that'd he'd ever dare to invade the man's privacy by asking.

"I..." Squall eventually tried to respond, but broke off, helplessly dropping his gaze into his lap now. Somehow, his palms had started to become clammy, and he was beginning to feel like a complete, stuttering idiot.

"I can see your face with my own eyes, kid. Besides, I talked to Laguna," Ward finally explained, and his voice softened as he lowered it to a more quiet, comforting level. "I know what happened."

Squall glanced up at the man briefly, noting the concerned expression on Ward's face, before swallowing and answering in a weak voice, "... I see."

"The boys who did this," the brunette's boss continued in a deliberately noncommittal tone, gesturing vaguely at Squall with his gigantic hands, "They're students at your school, I assume?"

"They are," the dark haired boy admitted slowly, stretching the two words more than was necessary. He didn't want to get even more people involved in this messed up situation, but he also didn't want to disrespect Ward by lying to him, if only out of fear of losing his job.

"I see. And are they customers?"

Squall knew what Ward was referring to, of course, and he chose to answer offhandedly, "... Sometimes."

"Not anymore they're not."

Again, the confused young brunette looked up at his scowling boss, who was also a close friend of his father's, when he barked that cutting remark. Squall didn't realize that a very much overprotective Ward basically considered himself his uncle now, and that the bulky man had always been concerned for the young teen's well-being on a level that went beyond any kind of business relationship. The brunette _could_ tell, however, that the restaurant owner was furious, and his carefully exercised restraint showed very clearly in the way he was cracking his knuckles on the desk.

"But—"

"If any of those guys ever set foot into my restaurant again, you will let me know," Ward ordered, and obviously, he was nobody to be argued with. "If they ever dare to lay as much as a finger on you again, you will let me know. Is that clear, Squall?"

With an unsure, intimidated expression, Squall asked in a strained voice, "What...? What are you going to do?"

"That is none of your concern, son," Ward answered simply, his inflection hard and cold as stone, and yet his caring nature wasn't lost among the profound anger that was displayed on his face. "This matter will be handled by adults, as it should be. If they hurt you again, they will have to answer to your father, and to me."

"It... I'm... But I'm not... I can watch out for mys—"

"No, you _cannot_. You're a child," the man cut him off, ignoring the insulted, hurt look that appeared on Squall's maltreated features. "_We're_ the adults here. It's our job to protect you – not yours, and not Seifer's. And we will do anything in our power to keep you safe."

A defiant part of Squall wanted to argue and insist on his own, hard-earned adulthood, but deep down, he knew that the man was simply trying to take care of him. For the first time, he realized that maybe he had never been quite as alone as he'd always believed himself to be. Ward and Selphie evidently thought that his well-being mattered an awful lot, and although that was a somewhat troublesome concept to the reclusive brunette, it still managed to touch his heart.

"I guess... I understand," the hard-headed seventeen year old finally murmured, before adding a quiet, "Thank you."

"You're welcome, kid," Ward responded with just the flicker of a smile, while briefly patting Squall on the shoulder.

"I... I'm meeting someone, so... I, uh... I guess I better going," Squall ineloquently attempted to take his leave, looking embarrassed as he was darting helpless looks around the room. Truth be told, he'd only been inside Ward's office once – on the day he'd been hired – and being alone with the man was slowly starting to make him uncomfortable. The dark haired teen was always on edge, mentally preparing himself for yet another lie or excuse he'd have to toss at anyone who was being just a little too nosy. It wasn't something he enjoyed doing, because his personality had never agreed with dishonesty, which was part of the reason why he usually chose to stay away from others.

"Very well," said Ward, "Go on ahead then. How about I'll see you back at work sometime next week, when your wounds have had some time to heal?"

"Yeah," Squall nodded as he stood. "Sounds good."

"Great. See you next week, then."

"Okay. Thank you."

Feeling more relieved than he had prior to entering the diner, Squall quickly exited the man's office, unwilling to give his boss a chance to ask him any more questions about the precise circumstances of Jeff's assault on him. It was the last thing Squall felt like dealing with at the moment.

As the brunette stepped back into the dining area, however, he quickly had to rectify that thought; the real thing that he least felt like being confronted with was currently sitting at a small table by the entrance, eagerly looking around. His eyes and mood darkened as he screened the frame of a young woman whom he had despised for almost as long as he'd known her.

'_... Rinoa.'_

He sucked in a breath, attempting to still his reflexive anger, and he mentally tried to ward himself against what might possibly come to pass during their impending encounter.

Right now, he was prepared for anything.

With slow, concise steps, he approached the chestnut-haired girl's table. She was sitting in an expectant kind of pose with her right side displayed towards him and her arms wrapped around an object in a black plastic bag that she was cradling in her lap. He noticed that she was wearing her cheerleader outfit underneath her long, light blue coat – apparently, she had left school not too long ago. Something in Squall's face curled disdainfully when he remembered the countless times she had mocked him while wearing that same cheerleader captain get-up, but for the moment being, he decided to ignore whatever bitterness he harbored towards the annoying girl.

'_... Let's just get this over with.'_

To his surprise, he didn't even have to vocally announce his arrival. When he had come within nearly an arm's length of her, she suddenly flinched and turned around, jumping out of her chair so hastily that it almost fell over. Whatever cold-hearted greeting he had originally prepared for her died on his tongue the very instant her face reeled towards him and her large, doe brown eyes met his own.

'_Oh, **shit**.'_

Rinoa was standing before him with her entire left cheek discolored by a disturbing mixture of scarlet and blue. Her eye was swollen and bloodshot, free of the makeup she'd usually wear, but still, she somehow managed to hold his gaze. Squall distantly remembered her being back-handed by Jeff when she had stubbornly tried to interfere during the bully's assault, and as much as he had always hated her, the brunette still couldn't keep his stomach from turning at the sight of her battered face.

She was a girl. Regardless of how bitchy and ugly she could be, this wasn't supposed to happen to a _girl_.

Somehow, it hit much closer to home than he wanted to admit.

'_That sick bastard.'_

So they stood across from each other, wordlessly measuring each other's presence, unbothered by the bustle of the restaurant around them. Truly, the girl looked horrible, and despite the fact that Rinoa had partly initiated Squall's abuse, the brunette still couldn't help but feel responsible for her maltreated state. She had stood up for him when he had least expected it, and she'd probably pay for her fearless actions for weeks to come.

"Squall."

Rinoa's voice was soft and trembling over his name when she had finally gathered herself enough to speak to him. The girl's dark gaze searched Squall's face, which looked no better than hers. She'd always thought of him as fascinating and beautiful, ever since that day she'd first set her sights on him at Deling City High. Nothing about their relationship had ever gone as planned; all she'd ever wanted was for him to like her, to pay attention to her when he'd always ignore everybody else. Instead, he'd been the one she couldn't have, the one who'd made her feel so undesirable, and as his steel blue eyes rested upon her solemnly, she regretted hurting him, more than she had ever regretted anything in her life.

"... I'm so sorry."

As Squall studied her bruised face, he could tell that her apology was about more than just Jeff's attack, and he could also tell that she meant every word of it. Perhaps she wasn't the smartest or kindest girl he'd ever come across, and perhaps she'd never change her bitchy, manipulative ways, but for now, he breathed a long, low sigh that ached methodically in his chest, and he decided to let it go.

In a quiet, almost peaceful voice, he replied, "I know."

"Squall, if I could take back what happened, I promise, I would!" she told him, sounding desperate to his ears as she clutched the plastic bag she was holding more tightly with her hands. "This... this is all my fault."

"No. What he did... has nothing to do with you. It's been a long time coming," the brunette murmured dully, clearly referring to the deeply seated grudge that Jeff had been holding for years. "He was just waiting for the right opportunity."

"But I was the one who spread those rumors about you," she insisted. "At the time... I was just angry. I felt rejected. I didn't really think you were... you know. Not until I saw you and Seifer together that one night after Homecoming, anyway. I just... I got my feelings hurt. I know that's no excuse. I know I was so ugly to you, but I never wanted anything like this to happen to you. Never. I swear, Squall. What Jeff did to you was... _horrible_."

She was tilting her head, giving him an almost expectant look, but he simply stared back at her, saying nothing. He didn't want to acknowledge what had happened, didn't want to go through it again.

It wasn't something he could handle.

Swallowing, she continued. "If... If I hadn't spread all those lies about you, then... maybe... maybe Jeff wouldn't have tried to—"

Squall immediately flicked up his hand, cutting her off. He was done with the topic, done listening to her apologies. He had no interest in hearing her recite the horrors that Jeff had attempted to inflict upon him; at this point, nothing good was going to come from it.

"Whatever you told him makes no difference," the brunette explained with surprising patience, but he was starting to sound exhausted. "What you did was fucked up, but when everything is said and done, Jeff doesn't care what I am, or what I'm not. He never did. None of that matters to him. He's completely fucked in the head, and that's all there is to it."

The dark haired girl hesitated, before ultimately acknowledging that Squall wasn't interested in discussing the sensitive subject any further.

"Yes. I guess you're right..." she whispered, the words trailing off as her head veered to the side. She looked lost and ashamed, and it made the situation no easier for either of them.

Shifting in his stance, Squall grunted, "Has he been back to school?"

"No, he hasn't," she said, sounding bemused. "Neither him, nor the other two. I think Seifer beat them up pretty badly, but overall they seemed okay, I guess. I mean, he didn't kill them or anything. They all just... kind of limped away that day. I... told my parents I got hit in the face with a softball, so they didn't ask too many questions, but... I was thinking I should report Jeff and the others to the principal for what they did to you."

"No," Squall rejected her idea immediately. "I don't want that. They might try to get Seifer in trouble, too. It's not even worth it."

"But... but what if—"

"I said no."

He'd shot her down without deliberation, and although she didn't agree with his decision, Rinoa knew well enough that this wasn't up to her. So she sighed and shuffled her feet aimlessly on the floor, muttering with reluctance, "Well... alright. If that's what you want."

Squall simply nodded at her, saying nothing further. As she watched him, his blue eyes glaring back at her, his face so cold and hauntingly beautiful, looking almost frozen and yet strangely more alive than normal, she could tell that something about him had changed over the past few days.

"So... you and Seifer..." she started in a poignant tone, while performing an indistinct motion towards him with her right hand.

Squall, however, only snapped at her, "That's none of your business."

His behavior was, perhaps, no more charming than it ever had been, but for all it was worth, she knew that he was trying. He'd been a lot kinder than she had expected... a lot kinder than she figured she deserved.

"You're right... of course it isn't," Rinoa agreed immediately, before her lips curved into a sad sort of smile. "I suppose... maybe this is for the best. At least I understand now why you rejected me all those years ago."

This time, Squall remained silent. Of course he knew what she was referring to, but he wasn't planning on opening that can of worms if he could help it. If she really thought that his homosexuality was the reason he had shot her down when she'd asked him to be his date for a dance, she was decidedly mistaken, but he didn't care enough to correct her.

At the end of the day, none of it made any noteworthy difference.

"Hey, you can't blame me for trying," the girl suddenly giggled, seeming a bit less morbid than before. "After all, I always thought you were the most handsome guy in our entire school."

Squall's forehead creased at that comment, and he quietly raised his brows. He'd never truly been aware of the obnoxiously high opinion Rinoa clearly had of his looks, and he found her flattery entirely misplaced. After all, Squall had never really considered himself worthy of any kind of compliments, whether in regards to his physical attractiveness, his drawing skills, or anything else along those lines.

"Anyway..." she sighed eventually, giving him another smile that was tinged with a hint of sorrow. "I hope everything will work out for you guys... I really do."

With that, she took one step forward and pressed the black plastic bag into his hand, holding on for just a few seconds longer than she should have.

"I looked at it to make sure it's not broken," she murmured softly, sounding apologetic. "... It's beautiful."

"Thanks," he acknowledged her words with an off-pitch growl, and she finally let go of the bag he had abandoned in the snow in front of her only two days ago.

"I really am sorry for what happened," Rinoa whispered as she gave him one last, searching look, and he thought he could see her tearing up. "I never meant for any of this to happen to you. I don't know what went wrong... but I hope you'll be able to forgive me, one day."

Before he'd ever had a chance to respond, she had turned on the heel and hastily exited the dinner through the front entrance, leaving behind an empty table and a scarred boy with an even emptier mind. Squall merely watched her leaving, holding the plastic bag with his statue slack by his side, not understanding why one of his worst enemies had just returned one of his lost possessions and begged his forgiveness. His eyes became distant as they stared at the glass door of the restaurant, never seeing the snow flurries gently dancing through the air outside. Somehow, his life was growing just a little less horrifying with each passing moment, and yet there was a shadow growing in his heart as he stood there, wondering whether this sudden, newfound peace with Rinoa, and Ward's proclaimed wish to protect him would come at a price that he'd never be able to pay.

* * *

Originally, this chapter was supposed to be A LOT longer, but I decided to cut it in half, as to not take another year to finish it. I think it will make more sense like this, in the end.

Thanks for reading, as always!


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